


Silver and Indigo

by BlueRoboKitty



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Age Difference, Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Background Relationships, Blood and Gore, Dark Comedy, Keith is 18 Shiro is 25, M/M, Mild Sexual Assault, Minor Character Death, Romance, Serial Killers, Sexual Content, Sheith Big Bang 2017, Slow Burn, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, Underage Drinking, Underlying Angst, background allurance, background hidge, it's evolved beyond my control, past kallura, this fic is a monster, yandere keith
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-16
Updated: 2017-09-16
Packaged: 2018-12-30 08:19:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 6
Words: 49,632
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12104583
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BlueRoboKitty/pseuds/BlueRoboKitty
Summary: [Prompt #6 for Sheith Big Bang 2017!!!]Takashi Shirogane is in college, going on 25, and so tired. When his classmate Allura hooks him up with a friend of hers at a sorority party, he isn't sure what he expected but it wasn't this. Freshman Keith is younger, completely out of control, and a welcome distraction.18-year-old Keith Song had every intention of making tough-looking Shiro his latest victim, until Shiro turns out to be unexpectedly charming, sweet, and even cute. What kind of serial killer falls in love with his victim? Keith, apparently.Perhaps true love does come for everyone, even serial killers. Dating Shiro has even allowed Keith to forget his itch. Until some people start getting a little too flirty, too handsy with his new boyfriend. Then that old itch returns…[Now updated with art by boredbeingregular (part 2) and Grey (part 3)]





	1. Part 1

**Author's Note:**

> I can't believe I actually finished this. This fic was originally meant to be just a really stupid yet cute dark comedy about a serial killer falling in love and going all yandere over him. Because I absolutely love the yandere trope, and it's rarely used with male characters. I used the Sheith Big Bang to motivate me to actually finish it in the midst of everything else that was going on in my life. And, honestly, I probably wouldn't have finished it without the BB prodding me to, alongside the amazing support of the mods, my artists, and my beta. 
> 
> A lot has happened in my life since I first submitted this summary to the BB. I moved 2,000 miles across the country with all the belongings I could pack in our car. My husband left to spend a year overseas. We got into a bad car accident. I've spent the past two months feeling like a complete stranger in my own hometown that I haven't lived in for the past ten years. I think that's why this fic evolved in the direction it had, went way deeper than I intended it to go. Keith's and Shiro's relationship was meant to be a romcom with some darker elements, the Allurance background drama was just supposed to be a short, funny gag. But I guess my subconscious feelings ended up inserting themselves as I wrote. The fic became much, much longer than I had anticipated, the plot heavier as these characters' issues started taking over the spotlight. And, it's a lot more tender that way? Not as humorous I was going for, flirty banter aside, but much, much fluffier. Probably from my need to have some tenderness in this chaos that I've gone through these past few months and am still trying to recover from. 
> 
> As a result, this fic has become incredibly precious to me. I've developed a deeper attachment to this ship, and to Shiro, especially, as I finally was able to make his characterization my own. 
> 
> Since I've never been a highkey Sheith shipper, I hope you may forgive me if I've interpreted their interactions differently. Considering also this fic is an AU where Shiro and Keith actually don't know each other, and Keith was friends with the rest of the cast long before Shiro came into the picture instead of the other way around like in canon (assumingly). Please enjoy this fic that has captured so much of my heart. Writing it has been an incredible journey and a source of comfort during these darker days. 
> 
> Beta by @[mikuridaigo](http://mikuridaigo.tumblr.com)  
> Part 2 Art by @[boredbeingregular](http://boredbeingregular.tumblr.com)  
> Part 3 Art by @[Grey](https://twitter.com/ISLEDGREY)

**1**

It’s the anger in their eyes that made him feel the most alive. That made all this worth it. That last surge of rage, the tiniest flash of survival instinct kicking in, an animal that has no choice but to fight.

Not that he enjoyed the suffering of others that much. Nah, he could barely stand crying, so criers were granted swift ends. Fighters, on the other hand, fighters made things fun. He tried his best to pick fighters the most, but, you know how it is, people can surprising.

When they fight, they were angry, and when they were angry, their blood boiled. Literally boiled. So warm every time it washed over his hands when he finished the job. So, so, _so_ warm.

Unless they cried. Then their blood was lukewarm, and like coffee gone cold, nothing but bitter disappointment and a moot point, all that effort gone to waste.

The sharp jingle of his phone cut through the air, and the red-rimmed eyes of his newest victim, a crier, sparked with hope. He lowered the knife, wondering if it would be wise to answer. Probably, it could be something important. Not too many people called him unless it was important, and it usually regarded school.

He leaned forward, level with those eyes. They were large and pretty, an interesting shade of green, vibrant from all those helpless, desperate tears. Hmm, maybe there was something to criers, after all. Mumbled pleading came through the duct tape as he checked to make sure it was tight enough around that mouth. He couldn’t have his victim somehow biting through the tape and scream while he was on the phone. That would be horribly inconvenient to explain. Unfortunately, he wasn’t a very good liar, and if the person calling him was who he thought it was…

“Coming, coming,” he muttered irritably as he placed the knife to the side. At least he hadn’t cut into his victim yet. Last thing he wanted was blood all over his phone.

Ah, he knew it. “Hey, Allura,” he greeted pleasantly. Sorority princess and the top of her class, she was a party animal when she wasn’t studying, and constantly inviting him over for one of her weekend bashes. And he always ended up going (if anything, just to humor her), even if he never stayed very long. He wasn’t that great at parties. Present company could confirm. 

He might have had a small crush on Allura when they met in the group home about six years ago, when she had mentored him as part of a youth program she'd volunteered for. Maybe an ember of that old flame still lingered in some way. She had been his first, after all, in many ways. 

“You coming over this Friday?”

She was not one for idle chatter. Or texting.

He ho-hummed like he was bored. “I dunno, Allura, I might actually study for this astronomy exam. My professor is kinda merciless.”

His victim hadn’t looked away from him, staring wide-eyed and confused. Must be an interesting sight, a monster acting like a normal college kid fresh out of high school, young and sweet, only eighteen. Not much of a dancer, though.

“You’re coming over,” she replied decidedly. “Besides, there’s someone you absolutely must meet, and it took me forever to convince him to come. He’s like you. A complete shut-in.”

He sighed with slight exasperation. “Are you trying to hook me up with your classmates again? The goth chick you hooked me up with didn’t like me because I wasn’t vegan, and that other guy in your writing class turned out to be a total weirdo who wanted me to wear cat ears all the time.”

“Well, you gotta kiss a few frogs before you find your true love. Besides, if I don’t hook you up with someone, then who will? If not for me dragging you outside, you’d never see the light of day.”

He snorted. Yeah, that was mostly true. “You sure that’s a good idea, though, two complete shut-ins being together? Then even _you_ couldn’t get me to go outside.”

“At least you wouldn’t be alone.”

It took everything in him not to laugh at the complete irony. “Oh, I’m not always alone,” he purred, looking pointedly at his victim. The poor thing was shaking all over again, help merely a scream away if only the duct tape wasn’t there.

“Your cat doesn’t count, Keith! Anyway, the party starts at seven, usual place, I’ll have your blind date with me so try not to be too late.”

“Yeah, yeah. I’ll be there, don’t worry about it.”

“Thanks, Keith. You’re an amazing friend. You’re gonna like this guy, promise. He’s totally your type. A complete nerd.”

“Oooh,” he replied with mocking excitement, “I like nerds.”

Allura blew a raspberry into her phone to which he responded in kind and hung up because that was how the two of them said goodbye. It was their thing.

Placing his phone to the side, he picked up the pair of glasses, rims speckled with dried blood from the victim’s head wound, and put them on.

“What do you think?” he asked, pointing to the glasses and tilting his head a little, like a cute little model in a teeny-bopper magazine. “You think this nerd would like glasses on me?”

The victim replied with only a tiny, meek whine, eyes dull and resigned now that the last glow of hope had been snuffed out with a single tap of his thumb on his phone.

Knife back in his hand, he knelt down in front of the victim, their eyes level again. “I dunno, I’m pretty terrible at parties. I’ve never been able to make friends easy. People think I’m too standoffish. But you pay attention to me.”

The victim nodded quickly, fresh tears trickling down.

“Don't get me wrong, it's not like I don't try. Allura’s been there for me since middle school, so I gotta at least show up when she asks me. That makes me a good friend, doesn’t it?”

The only answer the victim could make was the muffling sound of a quiet scream as he drove the knife into soft flesh, warm blood squelching out of the wound over his hand and wrist. Hmm. Warmer than he’d thought it would be for a crier.

“Damn right it does,” he whispered darkly. “It makes me the goddamn best.”

 

 

**2**

Takashi Shirogane, “Shiro” to pretty much everyone he laid eyes on from strangers on the street to his own family, wanted to die. 

Because in death, there were no tests to prepare for. There were no stacks of papers, papers, _and more papers_ to write, like being in the military all over again. There was no thesis he still hadn’t decided on a subject for looming over his head. No pushy professors, no students with idiotic opinions he had no choice but to argue with or be responsible for the dumbing down of the population, no high bars gleaming with standards he could reach if _maybe_ he ripped one arm right off his body and reached with that. College stretched on for an endless eternity of barely keeping his head above the water, but death was an endless eternity of sweet, sweet void.

Not that Shiro actually wanted to end his life, no, no, this was just the lack of coffee talking. There was never enough coffee these days, not anymore. Besides, he was alive now and it was for a reason, even if that reason looked like trying to catch up to a degree that still seemed so, so far out of reach.

Except, right now, he wasn’t sure if he could handle one of more weekend of being cut off from the rest of humanity, imprisoned by his computer filled with nothing but lecture notes, powerpoints, sources he kept second-guessing as valid enough for his requirements, and the occasional porn video because good grief he needed a five minute break sometimes to take his mind off things before retreating back to the saltmines.

Even those little breaks were becoming fewer and farther between. He was running out of hours in a day.

So when Allura, a classmate of his, called him and begged him to attend this party at her sorority, how could he have said no?

There were countless reasons why he _should_ have said no, but “should” and “could” are two entirely different words altogether. Allura was only a second year, but she was already the campus princess, and anything she wanted, she got. Shiro had politely declined her parties before in favor of his studies, and now that he thought about it, maybe this would be for the best. She was an incredibly sweet girl, inviting him like this despite his more declining than not, and he was tired of disappointing her.

He needed to get out. Before the walls of his dorm closed in on him.

And that’s how he ended up at this extremely loud party, bass pumping and beer flowing. Bodies crammed into the house, talking, dancing… at least, he hoped that was dancing. It was only eight, and already people were passing out, drunk the moment their classes let out for the weekend earlier that afternoon. Which meant that nobody was paying much attention to him.

And if they weren’t paying much attention to him, they weren’t looking at him. Which was good. This was a good thing. He could do this. It had been a while, but he could still do this.

“Shiro, you made it!”

He had barely taken five steps into the house when Allura was right in front of him and shoving a beer bottle into his hands. A beer he gladly accepted because, damn, could he use one right about now as he was still trying to get his bearings in this chaotic environment. Considering he had been holed up in his room for most of the semester, a room he had all to himself because reasons, the sound of his own voice scared him sometimes. Beer was good, beer was calming, cold on his tongue and warm in his stomach, tangy and filled with flavor with just a hint of sweetness to make it go down smooth. Good shit right here, the cheap stuff only used for the kegs. Little wonder Allura’s sorority had the best party reputation.

Her bright blue eyes blazed, brown cheeks deeply flushed, and several long silver curls tumbling out of her ponytail. She was already well past the point of tipsy. “To be perfectly honest, I was worried you weren’t going to make it.” She hooked his arm with her own, soft breasts pushing against him. Her voice seemed clear enough, her accent either from the UK or New Zealand or somewhere like that, he couldn’t exactly remember and hated to make assumptions. Classmates they were in one of his math electives, Shiro actually didn’t know that much about Allura. She never talked about her past, other than she lived abroad until circumstances had her move back to the United States shortly after she had begun high school.

“Would you be that disappointed if I didn’t?” he asked with a slight curl of a smile. Why not flirt a little?

She giggled, tossing her ponytail over one shoulder. “Well, not nearly as disappointed as the person I want you to meet.”

“That guy you’ve been telling me about?”

She giggled again, more enthusiastically, like a child with a huge secret she was absolutely dying to share. And just like that very child, she said nothing more, just continued to act happily cryptic as she lead him deeper into the house.

There was loud cheering coming from the large crowd Allura pulled him to, and then that cheering evolved into numbers. “Seven… eight… nine…!”

“Shoot, it’s started already,” Allura huffed, tugging Shiro a little rougher. Shiro could now see that a keg stand was underway, a very large guy holding up a much smaller student by the legs. Oh, that was Hunk, one of the school’s most promising football players. He was a sophomore like Allura, and had been in Shiro’s Intro to Statistics class last spring, which he ended up actually lecturing alongside the professor half the time.

“Careful with the valve, Pidge, you don’t wanna drown him!” Hunk was saying with a worried look.

“Don’t be careful with the valve, Pidge!” a lanky guy with brown hair jeered.

“I know what I’m doing, this isn’t my first rodeo, y’know!” Pidge yelled back. 

Oh. Shiro recognized that voice anywhere. That was Katie Holt, his best friend’s younger sister. He had no idea she was going to this school. Then again, he and Matt hadn’t spoken much lately, not since Shiro all but literally buried himself in schoolwork, and Matt had already graduated last year. Huh. Shiro wondered why they were calling her ‘Pidge’. Her voice, the short, wild honey blonde hair, the glasses… yup, she was definitely Matt’s sister sitting right there in a sorority party holding a valve in some guy’s mouth as he chugged beer through it.

Wow. Not something he'd thought he'd ever see with his own two eyes. He'd known Katie since she was eight, when he and Matt were high school buddies. The last time he saw her had been over the summer, when he had decided to crawl out of his hole for a bit and interact with actual other human beings by visiting the Holts. Katie had longer hair then, and no glasses. Now with her pixie cut and large frames, she looked like a younger, feminine version of Matt. They called her "Pidge" (?) but that was most definitely little Katie. Taking part in a keg stand. 

Matt would freak. 

“…fifty-nine… sixty!... sixty-one… sixty-two…!”

“Holy kitten-tits, he’s going for seventy!” Hunk cried.

“I hope he barfs all over himself,” his lanky friend groaned.

But at sixty-six, the guy Hunk was holding had enough. And neither did he barf. 

Shiro was not much of a romantic person. He liked it just fine in stories and such for narrative effect, but didn’t believe such things happened in real life. You know, the feeling when you look at someone and the entire world just goes completely still. The music fades into the background, and everything else ceases to exist. Time slows to a crawl, lingering on that one moment when eyes meet for the first time.

Indigo. The deepest indigo.

If there was a color to describe this very moment, that’s the color Shiro would pick.

Breathing hard with a few drops of beer dripping from wet lips, indigo eyes gleamed at him from beneath bangs of jet black hair for the briefest of heartbeats before the keg drinker stood to his feet. With a cheeky grin, he flashed the bird with both hands at the screeching crowd.

“Hunk, hold my legs, I’m going again!”

“Lance, I don’t think that’s a good – “

“Just do it!”

“Ugh, fine.”

“Uh oh,” Allura muttered, then she yelled in a singsong tone, “Laaaaaance, if you puke, I won’t dance with you tonight.”

“Allura, baby!”

It was liking calling over a puppy, that was the impression Shiro got as the lanky brown-haired guy named Lance came rushing over, the crowd parting out of his way. He looked like he was going to leap into Allura’s arms, but at the last possible second, she stepped to the right and he went to embrace the floor instead with a deafening thud.

 _“Oooh,”_ the crowd moaned sympathetically.

“Harsh,” Shiro whistled as Allura bent down to pluck Lance’s beer out of his hand.

She took a deep swig of the stolen beer and shrugged. “He knew what he was getting into.”

“Plus, she just saved him from completely humiliating himself by trying to outdrink Keith, the keg stand favorite,” Katie cut in with a snort. “Heya, Shiro! Don’t tell my brother.” She grinned from over her bottle. “It’s totally non-alcoholic, I swear.”

“Best Damn Cherry Cola is actually – “ Lance yelled from the floor, voice muffled by the carpet, and then yelped with she kicked his foot.

“You two know each other?” Allura asked, nodding at Katie (Pidge?? That was gonna take some getting used to). 

“Yup. He went to high school with my brother.”

“I heard him call you ‘Pidge’?” Shiro asked, gesturing to Lance.

“Oh, yeah. So, I kinda joined this sorority ironically and used the name ‘Pidge’ to be stupid, and wouldn’t you know it, I ended up getting in.”

“Because I’m awesome,” Allura interjected.

“And my new name stuck.”

Shiro stared. “Wait, but, aren’t you still only, like, seven-“

“SHUSH!” Pidge and Allura hissed at him so harshly, Shiro jumped. He’ll take that as a ‘yes’. Wow, bad girls, the both of them, he could easily see the two of them inspiring horrible behavior in each other. Katie, erm, Pidge always had been the more mischievous of the Holt siblings.

“Lance, you’re not dead, you can stop being over dramatic now,” Hunk groaned as he walked over with the keg stand favorite, Keith.

“Allura hates me,” Lance moaned into the carpet.

“She doesn’t hate you, you’re just too easy. Also, we got a new face, don’t be rude.” He smiled at Shiro, an expression of pure sunshine and spring afternoons with a hint of shyness. “Nice to meet you, I’m Hunk.” He didn’t extend his hand, keeping to his shy, cautious bubble, which made it all the better for Shiro, with one hand holding his beer and then other buried in his pocket.

“Shiro. We never really met, but I remember you from my Intro Cal class last year.”

“Oh, yeah! That’s right. Man, I didn’t recognize ya with your new hairstyle. Looks good.”

Shiro’s smile faltered only just slightly. He was used to this by now. It was only natural for people to assume that the white frock of his bangs was dyed, like some comic book character. The opposite was actually true. When Shiro had resumed attending college last spring, he had painstakingly tried to dye his bangs black like the rest of his hair. But the upkeep had been too much of a pain in the ass, so he hadn't bothered this semester. Let people stare, then. The hair wasn't nearly as exciting as his right arm, anyway, and that was something he couldn't hide as easily. 

“Thanks. Been trying that ‘new school year, new me’ look.” That was funny, that sounded funny, right? 

A snort from Keith, Mr. Indigo Eyes.

Shiro’s heart skipped a beat. Horribly cliché but no less true.

“And this is Keith,” Allura said, and Shiro could swear her face was about to split wide open with how big her smile was. Ah, this must be the secret she was hiding since he stepped into the house. “Keeeith, this is Shiro, the guy I’ve been telling you about.”

Those indigo eyes traveled slowly down from Shiro’s face and back up again with, what was hopefully, interest. “Oh, I see. The so-called nerd. Looks a little too built for that.”

Shiro balked. N- _nerd?_ His inner college freshman just died from humiliation.

“Oh, you’re a nerd, too!” Pidge remarked at Keith, sticking out her tongue. “Just because you’re the campus keg stand champ doesn’t make you any less so.”

Keith shrugged. “Some guys can go two minutes, sixty-six seconds isn’t that impressive.”

“Yes, and each one of them pukes up afterward all over my floor,” Allura retorted.

“I only puked a little bit, and I was sick that night!” Lance lifted his head a little. “And it’s not your floor.”

“Mmm, it will be one day.”

“Allura’s been planning to usurp the sorority throne one day, the only reason I actually completed my initiation ritual,” Pidge pointed out. "Definitely can't wait to see that!" 

Keith cocked his head at Shiro with a smirk. “What’s your longest time on a keg stand, big guy?”

“Um…” Shiro shook his head, “I don’t really remember. It’s, um, been a while.” He knew it, but he really couldn’t remember, not with Keith staring at him like that, so confident and… and smirky-like. His voice was kinda nice, too, soft with a slight rasp.

And it had been a while since he partied that hard. A long while.

“You should totally do one!” Lance exclaimed as he jumped to his feet, nimble for someone who was probably a drink or two from being completely wasted. “Help me beat this guy’s oh-so-perfect record.”

"Oh, you'll just throw up again," Hunk sighed with a roll of his eyes. 

The protest was right there on the edge of Shiro's tongue. He was more than content to just hang out, knock back a few more beers, and watch everyone else have their fun. And he heavily suspected on a self-conscious level that he was the oldest person in this sorority house. Someone his age would be a grad student by now, not still playing catch up and living in the dorms, even if he had his own room. 

Five pairs of younger eyes stared at him expectantly. Hunk with pleading russet brown, Pidge with anticipating amber, Lance and Allura with respective dark and sky blue curiosity, and Keith...

Those indigo eyes were curious as well, with a fixated stare that challenged him. Sized him up. _Go on, try to beat my record,_ those eyes seem to say with all the clarity if Keith had spoken aloud. _Impress me, nerd._

And there was no way Shiro was going to turn that silent dare down. 

 

 

**3**

Shiro’s reluctance lasted maybe three seconds with this enthusiastic group. But on the keg stand, he lasted one-hundred-and-fifty-two. It had taken Lance to help Hunk hold all 6-foot-four, two-hundred-and-fifteen pounds of muscle (but only because Shiro was taking so long and Hunk's arms were getting tired). The entire crowd gawked as he stood back up, pretty much all of them expecting this new guy to vomit immediately.

Shiro didn’t. None of them knew him back his freshman year, although his keg stand record had just given them a pretty good idea. And once that idea settled in, the whole house exploded with cheer, the floor shaking with stomping feet. Shiro swayed a bit, grinning with modest stupidity as he was congratulated. He glanced over at Keith, who looked genuinely impressed, and felt his face warm all over… or maybe that was just the alcohol finally settling in. Challenge met. 

“You are totally my hero!” Lance cried, and threw his arms around Shiro, making him stiffen a bit because he wasn’t expecting to be hugged by a complete stranger tonight regardless of how drunk people around him were. “You kicked Keith’s ass!”

“Nice, he can drink more beer than me in one go, whoo,” Keith deadpanned.

“Okay, that’s enough out of you,” Allura cut in, and pried Lance off Shiro’s body. “C’mere, you can’t beg me for a dance all night only to forget about it now.”

“Jealous?” Lance smirked.

“You know what? You can stay here and hug Shiro, I’ll dance with Pidge instead.” Linking their arms, Allura and Pidge skipped off with Lance running after them, begging Allura to wait for him and give him another chance.

Hunk took Keith and Shiro with him for more drinking games. Shiro didn’t do another keg stand, because that was just too much, and he did much prefer standing here watching Keith do one after the other instead. He didn’t get close to Shiro’s record, but the crowd was just as enthusiastic all the same. And Shiro could now see why Keith was the keg stand favorite, even after losing his reigning title to a complete newbie. 

Keith just made it look so… so sexy. The way the beer dripped from his lips when he finished, hair falling over his eyes, face flushed from being tipped upside-down. Just…

Shiro forced to keep his thoughts clean. It wasn’t like him to be this ridiculously attracted to complete strangers. He was more of a loner than he’d thought. Sad.

There were other games, too. Beer pong, of course, and interesting card game called “The Good, the Bad, the Ugly”, which had nothing to do with the movie at all. The card game did give Shiro a chance to impress Keith again, for it was the kind of game where you had to guess what the next card will be (higher or lower, black or red, etc..), and take a drink whenever you guessed wrong. Just a game of simple probability, really, and Shiro was very good at probability. His major did require a ton of math, so Allura introducing him as a "nerd" wasn't exactly wrong. Shiro ended up losing, however, as Hunk proved the better mathematician. 

"Damn, good thing you're not drinking," Keith remarked with a whistle. 

Hunk, Shiro learned, was the group's self-appointed voice of reason. Combined with a rather sensitive stomach that didn't digest beer very well, Hunk was more than happy to remain sober while his friends played around to their heart's content and ensured they all made it home okay. Pidge usually remained sober with him because she wasn't really supposed to be here, but for tonight, someone had brought Best Damn Cherry Cola and she couldn't stay away. 

Eventually, the party wanted to do more keg stands, taking Hunk with them so he could hold more people up. Both Shiro and Keith opted out, enough drinking games for the both of them for one night.

And just like that, Shiro and Keith were alone.

And just like that, Shiro never felt more awkward in his entire life. He had not been expecting to actually meet someone tonight. Allura never told him she had been plotting to set him up with one of her friends. Damn, had he known, he would’ve taken a bit more care in his appearance, more than just a pair of jeans slightly ripped at one knee and a black sweater that stretched over the round muscles of his arms and the barrel of his chest. He looked fine for a sorority party, but he didn’t look nice enough for meeting someone knew, as far as he was concerned. 

“Sorry for taking your spotlight earlier,” he said because, well, what else was he supposed to say? Hi, I'm Shiro? He knew that already.

Keith shrugged. “It’s whatever, I was tired of all the attention, anyway. Makes me wish Lance would just get good already and beat me like he wants. But luckily, you came to my rescue instead.”

He smiled. It was like looking directly into a bonfire hungrily consuming the wood beneath it.

“I don’t recognize you from any of the frat boys that frequent these things,” Keith continued after a drink of his beer. “Aren’t you in one? Being able to do an almost two-minute keg stand without throwing up, man, they would fucking love you.”

“Frats were never really my thing,” Shiro replied with a shrug. “I went to a lot of parties my freshman year, but that was about it for my social life.”

“Ah. Allura was right. You _are_ a nerd.”

Shiro laughed. “You might be shocked if you knew me a few years ago.”

“Uh-huh.”

“Hey, I did just do a two-minute keg stand!”

 _“Almost_ two minutes. Look, I get it, you spent your first college years beefing it up and partying it out, but a nerd’s a nerd no matter how much muscle you give him. What’s your major?”

Only the slightest hesitation when Shiro answered, “Astronomy with a concentration in Astrophysics.”

Keith nearly spat out his beer, choking as he tried to focus more on breathing than laughing. “Oh my _God,_ you are an _ultra-nerd!_ It’s worse than I thought. You, my bro, are gonna have to do, like, _five-minute_ keg stands to make up for that.”

“Sure, and what’s your major then?" Shiro retorted. "How do I know you’re not just as nerdy as me?”  

“Journalism. Not nerdy, but more like pretentious asshole who demands to know everything. Which I will completely own up to.”

“I don’t think you’re an asshole.”

“That’s because you haven’t met me when I’m sober.”

Shiro raised an intrigued eyebrow. "You're holding up well for someone who's drunk." 

Keith grinned and it was wider with a bit more teeth. “I’m really good at hiding it. I’m actually shitface wasted, otherwise I would’ve beaten you up and taken your lunch money.”

“You do realize you are like half my size, and I could crush you in my arms, right?”

Those eyes practically dazzled in the light, and a flash of Keith’s tongue flicked over his bottom teeth just above his beer bottle. “Not that I would complain, really.”

Shiro’s ears burned. Time to dial things back a couple of notches. Keith was, wow, no shame there. Shiro was in over his head.

He took a deep drink of his beer to stall for a bit of time and change the subject. “So, um, ah, your friends, um…”

“What about them?” Keith prompted.

“They seem cool.”

“Yeah?" He crinkled his nose a bit. "Yeah, I guess. But, they’re super nerds, too. Both Hunk and Pidge are into robotics, and as princess-y as our lovely hostess acts, she’s an anthropological linguist.”

“And that Lance character?”

 _“Peh!”_ Keith snorted into his beer. “He’s alright, good for a few laughs. Theater major, so that explains the dramatics.”

“But _you’re_ not a nerd.” Shiro pointed out. 

Keith reached into his pocket and then placed a pair of glasses on his face. “Not at all,” he replied with that heart stopping smile of his.

Shiro opened his mouth to compliment him because those glasses made Keith look quite cute, but Keith’s smile dissolved into a pouty glare before snapping, “And don’t you _dare_ say I look cute in these. I gotta wear them when I’m reading. Far-sighted. It sucks.”

“But they are really cute.”

Keith sputtered, cheeks turning an adorable shade of light pink. “I-I just said - !” 

“You said don’t tell you that you look cute. But the glasses are fair game.”

Keith softly growled back at Shiro's grin, not helping his case any that he wasn’t cute at all. Unable to help himself, Shiro reached out to gently touch the red frames. Something flaked over his finger. 

“Hey, you kinda got a spot right there. A stain?”

Keith’s eyes went wide, and he tore the glasses off his head. “Oh!” His finger scraped over the dark spot on the frame, causing tiny bits to flake to the floor. “I must’ve dropped the damn things in something. The cafeteria floor gets pretty gnarly. Thanks for – “

He stopped suddenly when something across the room caught his eye. “Uh oh. Oh, damn. Hold that thought for a second, duty calls.” Turning back toward the keg stand crowd, he shouted at the top of his lungs, “HUNK! _It’s happening!”_

Hunk immediately dropped the legs of whomever he was holding much to the displeasure of the crowd, apologizing profusely before charging into the room. “Where they at?” He asked Keith, and the other pointed.

Shiro followed that finger to see Lance and Allura pressed tight together against a wall, making out hot and heavy, clearly enjoying themselves. He continued to watch in slight confusion as Hunk and Keith ran across the room to pry the pair off each other.

“Noooo, Hunk, I just wanna kiss her a bit more!” Lance yelped as Hunk dragged him away.

“Keith, let me go!” Allura cried as Keith held her back.

“You said the moment you started making out with Lance is when you’ve had enough for one night, and to get you to go to your room," Keith replied with a firm shake of his head.

“No, it’s okay, I’ve changed my mind!”

“You said that you’d say that, too.”

 

 

**4**

Things calmed down quick once Pidge took Allura back to her room, convincing her by suggesting playing a horror video game with a few of the other sorority sisters. As Allura blew them all kisses good night, Hunk managed to rein Lance in by announcing they were going to Denny’s. The restaurant was just around the corner from the campus grounds, and the four climbed into Hunk's car.

“I don’t feel so good,” Lance moaned in the passenger’s seat.

“You will once you get something in your stomach,” Hunk assured him. “You haven’t eaten since lunch. I kept telling you to eat dinner, but nope, why listen to Hunk, I mean what the heck do I know?" 

Hunk drove an old sedan that was a hideous shade of yellow, but incredibly roomy inside with nice smelling leather seats and meticulously clean floors. Sitting in the completely dark backseat with Keith felt strangely intimate to Shiro. That could just be his own alcohol-rattled brain talking, he did do an almost two minute keg stand earlier, after all.

“So, what’s up with those two?” he whispered.

Keith tilted his head. “Hm? Which two? Lance and Allura?”

“Yeah.” Not that it was any of Shiro's business, but from the way Lance and Allura had been all over each other all night with the teasing and the dirty dancing, Shiro assumed they were together. 

“I’m right here,” Lance grumbled.

“Go back to sleep, buddy,” Hunk said gently. “If Shiro’s gonna be hanging with us, well, he might as well know.”

Hunk explained that Lance and Allura were exes, in the simplest terms that didn't exactly cover the complication of their complicated relationship. Both sophomores like Hunk, they had been together since their junior year of high school. Then once they graduated, Allura broke up with Lance. No one really knew why, not even Keith, despite being Allura’s closest friend. As far as Lance, and the rest of them knew, Allura just didn't want to be with him anymore, and she left it at that.

“Allura is an incredibly private person,” Keith further explained. “I’ve known her the longest in our group, but there’s a lot of stuff she doesn’t talk about. Including this.”

“I love her,” Lance pathetically moaned into the glove compartment.

“I know, buddy,” Hunk replied, gently patting his back. “Also, please don’t puke in the glovebox. My registration is in there.”

“As you can see, Lance clearly isn’t over her,” Keith pointed out in a quiet voice. “And it doesn’t help that Allura kinda still strings him along a bit.”

Shiro raised an eyebrow. “She doesn’t seem like the type who would do that, though.” Sure, in the class he had with her, she was playful and friendly, but not the string along type. Plenty of dudes and some girls flirted with her, and she never reciprocated in a way that made them think she was interested whatsoever. Then again, Shiro did not know her very well.

Keith's eyes went hard. “She’s not doing it to be cruel to him.”

The whole thing just sounded so needlessly complicated, Shiro thought. Even if he was the least qualified to have an opinion about the affair because he actually didn’t know any of these people.

“Anyway, it’s ultimately not our business,” Keith added with a shrug, and he turned away to lean against the door frame and stare out the window.  

“And she knows she gets very handsy while drunk,” Hunk pointed out, “so she trusts us to interfere when she and Lance start to get frisky. She doesn’t want to hurt Lance, and she wants to stay friends with him. Which is important because they do have the same mutual friends, those mutual friends being us, of course. There’s actually very little drama between them, you’ll be pleased to learn. Except when the alcohol comes out. And then this happens. And Lance will cry about it for the next couple of hours or until he passes out, whichever comes first, but once he sobers up, it won’t be a big deal to him, either. Just gotta ride it out sometimes."

Shiro realized that Keith was giving him a very intense look. Maybe it was the trick of the light flickering in the car as they passed under the street lamps, but Keith’s eyes seemed to glow.

Lance moaned and with it came a horrible gurgling sound. 

"And you get your head outta my glovebox!" Hunk cried. "You puke in my baby, you're walking home, I mean it this time, Lance!" 

 

 

**5**

Lance didn't puke in the car, but he did end up puking three times in the Denny’s bathroom before actually attempting to eat something. “The room won’t stop spinning,” he kept softly whining into his plate.

“Just try to get a little something in your system,” Hunk pleaded gently, still rubbing Lance’s back. A really devoted friend, that Hunk. He had gone into the bathroom to hold Lance’s head each time without complaint. Shiro wondered if he could ever be that good to someone.

He sat in a separate booth with Keith. Yeah, he would totally hold Keith’s hair back while he puked. Keith looked up at him from his coffee, and raised an eyebrow as if he could read that extremely weird thought that just crossed Shiro's mind.

“What?”

“Um, that’s a lot of whipped cream for a coffee.”

Nice one, Shiro. Not as weird as fantasizing holding this guy’s hair while he puked, not at all.

“I want to say I only drink coffee that’s like my soul, black and bitter, but that’s actually not true because that shit’s disgusting,” Keith replied. “I admit it, I like sugary coffee, and I eagerly wait our peppermint overlords this winter.”

Shiro laughed, and noted the look in Keith’s eye that seemed to be a mix of surprised and pleased.

“You know, you are the person who laughs the most at my terrible jokes,” Keith pointed out. He took a sip of his coffee, glancing away in a soft expression that was far different from the overly-confident attitude he’d had all evening. “Weirdo.”

“I just think you’re fun to be around,” Shiro said.

“Heh. Yeah?”

Before Shiro could answer, a voice asked, “Would you like any more coffee?”

Shiro hadn’t really been paying much attention to anything else in here, and at the moment, his concern for poor Lance and Hunk was mostly out of courteous curiosity. Keith had his undivided attention ever since the party, and that hadn’t changed until just now. So he jumped, slightly, when their waiter suddenly spoke up. Keith’s eyes gleamed with amusement. And here Shiro thought he would be oh-so-impressive since doing an _almost_ two-minute keg stand. He was all over the place. 

The four of them were the only patrons in here. They had been at the sorority party a lot longer than Shiro realized because his phone said it was already almost one in the morning. Their waiter was the only employee manning the dining room, the others probably out on a weed break in the back.

He didn't look that much younger than Shiro. Dark roots showing through blond streaks, and tons of freckles dotting his face. He gazed at Shiro shyly, holding the pot of coffee just over his mug. Shiro would have considered him really cute, actually, but at the moment, he was too focused on Keith. Which was interesting because no one person had ever held his attention like this before, not even in his previous relationships.

Shiro recognized that look on the waiter's face. He was aware he was an attractive guy, he had people throwing themselves all over him since puberty suddenly hit him like trunk in high school. And back in those days, before, he relished in such attention. Probably played around with other people a lot harder than he should have.

He wasn’t used to having this kind of attention, anymore, and kinda didn’t want it.

“He’s fine,” Keith snapped curtly. “Make yourself more useful and bring the check instead.”

The guy flushed slightly before turning away to go about his duties.

“Cold,” Shiro remarked.

“You looked bothered,” Keith replied nonchalantly. “You still think I’m fun to be around?”

“Yeah. Definitely. I hadn’t really had this much fun in while.” He winced a little when Lance jumped up from his booth to go racing toward the bathroom making loud gagging noises, Hunk close behind him. “Complications aside.”

Keith put his coffee down, and that intense gaze was back.

“Hey, I don’t live far from here. What do you say we ditch these guys and head back to my place?”

“You don’t live on campus?”

“What the university doesn’t know can’t do shit to me. I stay at my old man’s place. C’mon.”

"What about - ?" Shiro glanced over at the now empty booth where Lance and Hunk had been sitting. 

"All Lance is gonna do is cry about Allura, and Hunk is gonna be focused on Lance, this isn't the first time it's happened, come _on."_  

Keith threw down some cash without bothering to wait for the check, and he was out of the booth and grabbing Shiro’s hand before the older man could protest. Not that Shiro wanted to protest. Keith’s hand was a bit rough against his palm with the combination of his fingerless leather glove and calloused skin, and it made Shiro’s heart pound heavily in his chest with an excitement he hadn’t felt in a long, long time.

 

 

**6**

The night was frigid with the November air, hardly walking weather, but Shiro didn’t feel cold as he strolled beside Keith to his house. His face made him warm enough as it was, and his nerves even caused him to sweat a little. It had been so long so he actually been with someone who made him feel, well, made him feel like _himself._ He didn’t want to mess this up.

“So if you don’t mind me asking,” Keith spoke up after walking a block in contented silence, “how did it happen? Your face, I mean.”

He really, really was very _blunt,_ wasn’t he? Shiro didn’t mind at all. The scar across his nose was incredibly conspicuous, and everyone at the sorority had simply been too drunk to actually mention it. He might as well be honest. "Overseas deployment. I was Air Force Security Forces." 

If Shiro wasn't sure if he was impressing Keith at all tonight, there was absolutely no doubt whatsoever that he had impressed him now. Keith had stopped in his tracks, gawking at Shiro as if utterly star-struck. "You were in the Air Force?" 

It wasn't like Shiro had been in the Navy Seals or anything, the Air Force didn't exactly conjure up images of badassery to most people who didn't ask if you were a pilot. But Shiro smiled with a small swell of pride all the same. "I mean, I was just a cop, really, but yeah. I was going to get an Astronomy degree while I was in, get my officer commission, and try to become an astronaut." 

"Wow." 

Keith truly was that impressed. Even genuinely so. "Sorry," he said once he regained his bearings. "I actually wanted to join the Air Force myself, be a pilot. But I couldn't make the cut. That's when I found out I'm far-sighted, and I couldn't exactly afford corrective surgery." 

"You could've gone into other jobs." 

"Nah. It was pilot or bust for me. I can't just work on jets. I'd probably try to take one for a joy ride or something." 

"Heh. That would be a sight." 

Keith regarded him with a new kind of interest that he hadn't had all night. "So, like, why aren't you still in? Becoming an astronaut is a pretty awesome dream." 

Shiro's smile faded. Then he lifted his right arm to tug off his glove and roll back his sleeve. In the golden glow from the streetlight above, the metal of his robot prosthetic shown a dazzling silver, humming softly with every move Shiro had it make. As if it were possible, Keith's eyes went wider. "Oh," he breathed softly. "I... um..." 

"It's kinda cool, though it took me a while to get used to it," Shiro said. "My father's the director of the hospital here, and he and the Air Force got together to make this. One of the first fully functional robot prosthetics. I'm like an android now!" 

It wasn't cool. Shiro absolutely hated it. But for the sake of keeping the mood light, he wouldn't let Keith know that. It had already gone too dark for his liking. He hadn't been expecting spilling out his backstory to a complete stranger, attractive as he was.  

“Actually, that would make a you a cyborg,” Keith corrected, but not taking his eyes off Shiro's arm. 

“And you say you’re not a nerd,” Shiro shot back. “The only downside is I gotta go to all these appointments all the time to make sure everything is working okay. That’s probably not gonna end any time soon. But I least it got rid of that awful tattoo I got put on my forearm in middle school.”

He chuckled a bit, but Keith’s smile merely flickered over his otherwise sympathetic face.

Ugh, it was always like this, too. Shiro was so tired of all the sympathy, and it was surprising but no less disappointing that Keith had that same reaction. Couldn’t people just look at his arm and his scarred face and tell him he looked like an absolute badass and leave it at that? But they never did.

It wasn’t just schoolwork keeping Shiro in his room this past semester.

“When did it happen?” Keith asked, and now his voice was all gentle and cautious and slightly irritating.

"A few years ago," Shiro answered after a moment. Despite his growing irritation, it actually felt kinda nice to talk about this to someone. "My third deployment. I've been in and out of the hospital since, so I was only able to go back to school last spring. I kinda been playing catch up to get my degree in a timely manner ever since." 

"So, what, are you like thirty?" 

Shiro made a slight choking sound. "I-I'm not that old! Not even close!" 

Keith arched an eyebrow. "Then how old are you?" 

"I'm..." Shiro hesitated, obviously and awkwardly so. 

"Yeeeeah?" 

"Not quite twenty-five...?" 

Older than most people on campus who were also an undergrad. Shiro just couldn't get over that little self-conscious hangup of his, more of a hangup than his scarred face and robotic arm. And Shiro discovered during their introductions that Keith, like Katie - er, Pidge - was just a freshman. He gave Keith an uncertain, shy look. "Is that a deal breaker? You know, since Allura was trying to set us up and all." 

Finally, Keith’s playful smile came back. “Hmm. I dunno. Never been with a grandpa before.” 

Been with. Oh, man. Shiro shivered.

“You cold?”

“N-no.”

Keith smirked. “You just shivered.” And then he was leaning into Shiro, their bodies pressing close. “You mind if I warm you up a little?”

Oh man, oh man, oh Lordy-lord.

“You’re… eighteen, right?”

“Of course.”

Shiro sighed with relief. “Okay, just making sure.”

And then Keith leaned up into his ear. “My birthday was just a week ago,” he whispered, husky voice caressing the outer shell.

_“Um…!”_

Keith pouted a little, trying to look all innocent despite his eyes gleaming with mischief. “Is that a deal breaker?”

“N-n-no. I… um, I don’t mind. You’re a grown-ass man, now.”

“And you are ridiculously cute.”

Shiro’s face flared, heat all but steaming off the tips of his ears.

Keith's tongue flicked over his lips. “I think I kinda like you, Shiro. A little bit.”

He wasn’t sure how to process this information. He liked Keith, too, a lot for someone he had just met tonight.

“Hey, this is my place.”

Shiro hadn't even noticed they had resumed walking, but then again, Keith's house really wasn't that far. He lived on a street neighboring the campus, barely a couple of blocks away. His house was a cute little rancher with a neatly trimmed lawn and a wicker rocking chair sitting on the porch. “My dad actually doesn’t live here,” Keith explained. “I found him shortly after l was emancipated. He’s always gone on business, so he lets me take care of the place and not let it go to shit. Don’t get me wrong, I’m actually pretty close to the old bastard now, but his job makes him travel all the time. Maybe that’s why we get along so well.”

Keith stood in front of Shiro now as they approached the front door, porch boards creaking beneath their feet. Despite the upkeep, the house was still pretty old.

Another loud creak as Keith stood on his toes to meet Shiro’s lips with his own.

Shiro gasped lightly, enough to let Keith’s tongue slide inside his mouth. Keith’s lips were cold and a little chapped, but combined with the hot wetness of his tongue made Shiro groan and eagerly kiss back. He cupped Keith’s face with his non-cyborg hand, quickly taking over, sucking oh-so-lightly at that plush bottom lip. It was Keith’s turn to groan, longing, hands digging into Shiro’s shoulders.

It’s tempting to go inside with Keith. So, so tempting. Actually feel something again after spending so long in the unforgiving cold of loneliness.

But it was still much too fast for him to grasp.

He gently pushed Keith away, a thin thread of saliva snapping between them.

“I should make sure Hunk and Lance make it back to campus okay,” Shiro said softly. “Hunk seemed to have his hands full.”

“…oh.”

“I, um, really like you, too, Keith. Maybe more than just a little. And I definitely want to pick this up later. I just… I’m sorry. It’s been a while since I’ve interacted with another person like this. So I’m kinda freaking out a little. I don’t wanna mess this up.”

“Yeah, no, I totally get it.”

Keith reached into Shiro’s front pocket to take out his smartphone. Then he frowned before holding the phone out to him. “I need you to unlock your phone.”

Shiro chuckled as he unlocked his phone and even opened the contacts page for him. “I… I wasn’t giving you my phone number!” Keith protested, snatching the phone back. “But since it’s already opened, then I’ll put it in, I guess.”

“Then why did you take my phone?” Shiro teased.

“So I can make you friend me on Facebook, duh!” Keith shot back, blushing so, so cutely. “Wh-who just gives out a phone number these days?”

Shiro shrugged. “Old farts like me, I guess,” he replied with a grin.

“Just tell me you at least know how to text message,” Keith shot back as he added his contact info. “Nobody calls anymore.”

“Oh, I am hip with the text messaging, dude.”

“And don’t ever do that again.”

 

 

**7**

Shiro walked back to Denny’s feeling lighter than he’d ever been. He had kissed Keith one more time, an actual good night kiss, and nearly gave in when Keith whispered if he was sure he wanted to leave things at that.

But he had to. For now. He wanted to take things slow. Well, slow-er. Considering he did just kiss a guy he had only known for a few hours.

It felt so good, being human again, and he wanted it to last as long as possible.

 

 

**8**

That guy.

Tall. Muscular. And a fucking robotic arm, no less! This guy would probably put up an amazing fight. His own blood boiled just thinking about it. Hell, he might actually be in over his head this time.

Keith walked down into the basement, steps creaking loudly beneath his feet. That was the problem with this run-down shack of a house. Creaked and groaned and made it impossible to get some peace and quiet around here.

But it was quiet in the basement, thankfully.

The victim handcuffed to the workbench didn’t make a sound anymore. Not the slightest movement. Keith’s shoes seem to the stick to the floor with all the blood that had flowed almost all the way to the stairs. It always amazed him how much blood a person actually had.

He lifted the victim’s chin and eyes glassier than those of a dead fish stared back at him. Damn. He had been so excited, too. Enough to want to play with this crier a bit more, release these emotions burning within him.

Keith sighed and wondered how long he could put off getting rid of the body before it could stink up the place and cause a problem.  
A few hours should be fine. Enough for a nap and to reenergize.

“Thanks for letting me borrow your glasses, pal. They worked like a charm.”

He headed back upstairs to collapse in his bed and dream of all the fun he was going to have with Shiro tied to the work bench just like that. He had a feeling this one was going to last him a long, long time.


	2. Part 2

**1**  
  
It wasn’t like Keith had anything wrong with him. Not anything that anyone really noticed, anyway. He was smart, but not like genius smart or anything. He may have been a little more reserved with his emotions than others, especially as a teenage boy, but he still _felt_ things. He had a great amount of empathy for other people, more so if they were actually close to him. Being introverted for the most part, it took him a while to warm up to strangers, sure.  
  
He hadn’t wet the bed since a small accident he had when he was six, and that was because he had been too afraid to get up in the night and walk down the miles-long dark hallway to use the toilet. A night light placed in the hall had fixed the issue. He never tortured small animals, either. Hell, the ASPCA commercials used to make him cry when he was little because all the kitties and puppies looked so sad. Used to irritate his foster parents at the time, though his foster father did gently tell him that the animals were fine and the commercial was simply using them to trick people into giving them money. Cynical and suspicious of everyone, that couple had been, but not unkind or uncaring. Keith had been with them the longest, from ages five to eight, and he wondered if that’s where he had gotten his bleak worldview from. They had been this close to adopting him, actually, but maybe it was for the best that that hadn’t worked out in the end.  
  
Growing up in the system since he was a baby might have been a warning sign of sorts, except he got along with most people. Some of his foster parents could be somewhat uncaring, treating him like a living paycheck, but he couldn’t think of anyone who had been outright abusive to him. No one hit him or touched him in a bad way or yelled at him or make him think any less of himself. As he got older, less people wanted to take him in, and longer in the group homes he stayed. But that was as bad as it got, really.  
  
Allura was part of a youth group serving as a kind of mentorship to younger, unprivileged children like himself. A mistake in the listing ended up pairing them together because they were only two years apart, and she had been meant to go with one of the smaller children, also named Keith, instead. No one really noticed, and they didn’t bother correcting anything. He did develop a small crush on her, and they even messed around a little bit toward the end there when he had been fifteen, her breasts the first he'd ever touched. But that’s as far as it all went, just a pair of lonely high school kids trying to take the edge off. Besides, she was just too… too… _bright._ Allura did have a dark past, and it was apparent that she had since managed to crawl out of whatever pit she had been stuck in. Keith didn’t know the details, she never told him anything despite how close they got, but he did know the eyes of someone who had fought their way through hell and back to tell the tale and show off the free t-shirt if they wanted to. Whatever had brought her here to the United States from across the pond was long gone by now. He wouldn’t drag her back into that darkness by making her feel obligated to fight his demons, too. And then Allura ended up with Lance, and they seemed happy for a while, and that’s all she wrote.  
  
(Until Allura dumped Lance after high school which only confirmed Keith’s suspicions about her darker past because the two of them had been doing pretty well otherwise. Lance had been quite upset, something that still affected him especially if he drank, but Keith avoided that particular fallout and instead left it all in Hunk’s capable hands.)  
  
Back to Keith; so, yeah, his story was very typical of a kid abandoned by his parents when he was just a tot and growing up in the system and who managed to score an awesome scholarship to get into the local university so he wouldn’t end up on the streets when he was kicked out the minute he turned eighteen.  
  
He met his old man, too, shortly before graduating high school, and it wasn’t bad. Awkward, but not bad.  
  
“We really wanted to keep you,” the old man had said softly, looking more at his mug of steaming coffee than at his son. Jason he was called, and they didn't even share the same surname. Meaning his parents had not been married when Keith was born. They had been sitting in a booth at the café they’d agreed to meet at, Black Lion. Lance and Pidge worked there during that summer, and Keith had wanted them nearby… just in case. Jason looked like him somewhat, hints of Korean heritage in his pale features, more rugged, stubble on his chin and eyes not nearly as a vibrant indigo as they had been in his youth. So he had his father's eyes, not his mother's. It was almost disappointing. His Southern accent was thick, something Keith never picked up on due to moving from county to county and watching more television than hanging out with his foster families.  
  
“It just… didn’t work out.”  
  
That’s generally how it goes, doesn’t it? Things just don’t work out. Shit happens. Life turns on a dime. That last bit was from a Stephen King novel Keith read recently. One of his favorites. Keith hadn’t pressed for details that day. His father didn’t have to say anything for him to know that his mother was long gone. That was fine. The old man had said that they had wanted him and things just didn’t work out. That’s all Keith needed. Everything else was just unnecessary details. Filler material. The question of what could make a couple decide things weren’t working out when a child was involved was one Keith didn’t want the answer to, anyway. This was enough.  
  
So there really were no warning signs. Nothing anyone could see coming. Nothing Keith could see coming, either. Not that he was sure he could stop it if he had.

 

 

**2**  
  
Keith could remember his first murder just like he remembered his first kiss.  
  
His first kiss had been this guy whose name he had long forgotten. They were both in the eighth grade and had sneaked into a girls’ slumber party, of all the places to discover you actually batted for both teams (all teams, he would discover later). Keith spun the bottle and it landed on this freckled-faced Irish boy with auburn hair and gorgeous brown eyes. He was told to kiss the girl next to his right instead, but Keith would have none of that, took the boy by those blushing cheeks that hadn’t quite lost their baby fat, and kissed him solidly right on the piehole. And God bless that boy for kissing him right back without hesitation. The whole group sat in scandalized silence because that was the backwoods South for ya. Keith had merely been trying to impress the girls, and wouldn’t you know it, he really, really liked kissing boys just as much as he liked kissing those girls in the not-so-distant future.  
  
He smelled nice, that boy did. Probably didn’t expect his Axe body spray to attract one of his own, or maybe that was exactly what he had been hoping for given his lack of hesitation. Lips soft and tasted of cherry because the winter dried out everybody and so everybody carried that same brand of lip balm. The tongue was wetter than he had been expecting, but not unpleasant. He loved exploring that boy’s mouth, the grooves of his roof and the rougher edges of his teeth.  
  
But memories have a way of overly romanticizing the past. That kiss had actually been what anyone would expect from two inexperienced barely teenagers. It had been messy, slippery, and their mouths couldn’t angle right and tongues felt wet and alien. But curiously tantalizing. Keith would have gone further, probably, if not for present company expressing their gleeful disgust once the shock wore off.  
  
His first murder had been just as much of a rush through his system as his first kiss had been. And, horrifically, just as pleasurable.  
  
It had been an accident, really.  
  
As in, it wasn’t a premeditated incident. The act itself was definitely not an accident otherwise it would be involuntary manslaughter and, nah, it was absolutely, one-thousand percent a murder. Keith had wanted to kill the asshole, and he did so. Quite efficiently for his first time. Unlike when he lost his virginity because he had been too nervous to perform to par.  
  
Nah, everything went splendidly well with his first murder. Although, Keith couldn’t exactly remember why he had killed that guy to begin with. It wasn’t like he had been a horrible jerk like cheating his employees or beating his wife. Keith hadn’t done it for anything noble like that. But something had happened in the heat of that moment. And Keith killed him for it. And loved every second of it.  
  
Ah, the act itself Keith could remember with almost yearning clarity. Like the rush of his first kiss, how he would love to experience the rush of his first murder again. How the screwdriver sank into the skull past hard resistance into a soft, squishy embrace.  
  
It’s interesting to watch the life literally drain from someone’s eyes. The once vivid color of the iris grows cloudy and dark, and the shine fades away like final ember fading away in the darkness of the night. Keith wasn’t much of a poet, but he was a little proud of that one.  
  
It’s also interesting how much a person changes once they’re dead. Just a second ago, that guy was angry and sputtering heatedly about something Keith had done to piss him off, then shock and pain the moment Keith killed him, and then a serene look as death took him. And then this really stupid expression when the body became nothing more than a sack of meat bleeding all over his living room floor. Why had that guy been in his living room again? Oh well. Details. Filler.  
  
Unfortunately, the thrill of the kill came with the inconvenience of hiding the body. From all the crime TV Keith had watched growing up (because if there was one thing all his foster families had in common, it was their obsession with crime TV and thereby making all those interviews the reason why Keith never developed his Southern accent), he noticed that most of the mistakes occurred when trying to hide the body. Hiding it too far away made it far easier to discover and trace back. Too many variables involved. Too many unknowns.  
  
The only guarantee of getting away with murder was to ensure the body could never, ever be found and that meant nothing short of keeping an eye on it for the rest of your days. Or at least until the body is destroyed in some way. But a body is difficult to destroy without attracting attention. Even burning it can cause a smell and raise suspicions.  
  
Keith was really surprised how easy the answer came to him, standing there with a dead guy bleeding all over his old man’s floor. The victim was not his old man, nothing so gruesome, just some stranger. Jason had already left again, staying just long enough to meet the child he lost almost eighteen years ago and give him a house. Doing whatever it was he does, Keith never really pressed for those details, either. An itch in the back of his mind kept telling him that he had been abandoned again, but maybe that was just him being his usual cynical self, damn the Johnsons for instilling that in him. At least his old man left him this nice little house tucked away at the end of the street not far from campus, rent free and utilities paid per month by automatic withdrawal from some account Keith had no access to.  
  
As far as his school was concerned, Keith still lived in the dorms. The perfect alibi, really. Now with the near perfect way for him to dispose of the bodies.  
  
And that’s all she wrote.

 

 

**3**  
  
Takashi Shirogane would make an interesting kill.  
  
Really interesting.  
  
Keith never targeted a veteran before. Felt a little too unpatriotic. No doubt Keith had very solid, unflattering opinions about the state of their wonderful little government all the way back to the Founding Fathers themselves from their characters and political movements to their state of dress, but taking out his frustrations with society out on those in uniform seemed in poor taste. Especially when they tended to get the short end of the stick by being quickly forgotten by the very government they swore their service to mostly for a chance to get out of the economical crisis that aforementioned government put them in in the first place. Vicious cycle get.  
  
Still, Shiro interested Keith in a way that none of his victims – or anyone else, for that matter – had. He was so... big. Yeah, plenty of military dudes were badass looking but Shiro… g o d d a m n. Keith was more than tempted of taking Shiro up on his offer to crush him in his arms. Just have to play nice for a little while, lure him back to the house, and then go from there.  
  
He even had the perfect weapon he wanted to use. A beautiful virgin blade he had just bought at a knife show last week.

 

 

**4**  
  
“Whoa! S-slow down!”  
  
Keith laughed and it danced along the wind whipping behind them. “I’m only going sixty-five, babe. Not fast at all!”  
  
Despite that, Shiro’s clutched Keith all the tighter, and if Keith had wanted to be crushed by that pair of bulging biceps and taunt ligaments, then this was that moment. Shiro had a death grip around Keith’s waist, and buried his helmeted head against his shoulder. Keith could feel the cool steel of Shiro’s prosthetic arm pressed tight against his stomach, and he kind of liked it there. He laughed again because it was cute, actually, the way Shiro, a dude literally twice his size, clung to him.  
  
“You can’t enjoy the view with your eyes closed.”  
  
“Yes, I can!”  
  
Hard to believe this was a near 25-year-old adult man latched to his back as Keith sped – but not that much – down the freeway on his motorcycle that blazed like a cherry fireball in the mid-autumn afternoon sunlight. One of the few clear days they would get this season before winter settled in with a gray quickness. It was even a little warm out, high in the fifties, clear skies, perfect for taking your date out for a spin and terrorizing him a little bit.  
  
“D-d-did you just speed up!?”  
  
“No,” Keith replied oh-so-innocently. He was now going seventy-two.  
  
“You did! I know you did, I felt it!”  
  
“You love it.”  
  
“Keith!” Shiro pleaded. It was delightful hearing him plead like that. Keith wanted to make him do it again. For all kinds of reasons.  
  
“Fiiiine.” He slowed back down to sixty, the freeway speed limit. He refused to go any lower, no matter how much Shiro begged. “Better?”  
  
He felt the helmet against his shoulder nod up and down, and those arms around his waist tightened just a little bit.

 

 

 

 

**5**  
  
Keith didn’t terrorize Shiro with the motorcycle too much anymore, but to be fair, that was really the only thing they had to get around town outside the campus neighborhood. Shiro didn’t have a car, didn’t drive. He often took the bus or an Uber to get to wherever he needed to go. This struck Keith as a little odd, a man his age living on the college campus with no car and really nothing else to his name but the clothes on his back.  
  
The government really was quick to forget the people who served them.  
  
Eventually, Keith’s curiosity couldn’t be held back, anymore. They were on their third coffee date, where Keith was enjoying ordering Lance around to make his café experience spectacular. Lance didn’t rise to any of his bait, which was quite out of character for him, meaning that something else was on his mind so Keith gave up their game.  
  
“You got your parents to pay for your robot arm as an experimental treatment,” Keith was saying, and Shiro, used to Keith’s bluntness by now, simply let him talk, “and the VA pays for your tuition. You get a stipend and disability, but no house and no car and no real job.”  
  
Shiro sipped his coffee, not offended by Keith’s prying, prying that would be considered rather invasive and personal at this early stage of the dating game. Even so, he gave the smaller man a smile. “I even have a contractual job waiting for me once I graduate. I just need the degree.”  
  
Keith nearly choked on the wafer in his mouth. “So… what, are you just saving money?”  
  
“Mostly, yeah.”  
  
Now Keith’s curiosity was piqued, and he leaned forward a little bit over the table. “For what?” What could be so important to save for that he sacrificed having his own place and his own transportation.  
  
Shiro considered for a moment, and then shrugged. “Dunno.”  
  
“Seriously!?”  
  
He just grinned, black eyes shimmering like obsidian, and took another sip of hot white mocha.

 

 

 

**6**  
  
They hadn’t kissed since that night when they had left a sobbing, drunk Lance with poor Hunk at Denny’s, the night they’d met. The kiss had been amazing, but Shiro was adamant about taking things slow. Which Keith was completely down for, what kind of asshole would take issue with such a request? Still, he did not expect slow to be a literal snail’s pace. Shiro clinging to Keith on his motorcycle as they roared through town had been about as intimate as two of them got ever since.  
  
There was one other time when they actually did get a little physical, although it had mostly been by accident. A few nights ago, they had gone to a movie together, the latest horror flick gorefest trending all over social media, destined to be another cult favorite with all the other cheesy greats. Keith may or may not have had an ulterior motive behind his decision, which involved a certain larger man clinging to him during the scary moments. Or, possibly even better, if Shiro did not scare easily, then Keith could pretend to be frightened and be the one doing all the clinging.  
  
The movie was delightfully cheesy and gory that seemed more campy than terrifying, the kind of awful B-rated shit Keith loved. Nothing other could be expected of a movie about zombie cats, let’s be real. It was when he felt the weight against his shoulder, spicy aftershave mixing with the scent of butter popcorn all up in his nose, that his heart suddenly slammed hard in his ribs.  
  
Shiro got physical with Keith all right, but to use him as a pillow as he had fallen dead asleep.  
  
Keith stared, a trickle of sweat running down his temple, heart racing and blood pumping in his ears, completely and utterly unsure how to process this. Shiro had such long lashes, so black against the strands of white bangs that had fallen over one eye. He looked so soft and peaceful despite his size, his full mouth slightly open, slightly tempting. Keith resisted the urge to trace his finger over the scar across his nose because he was having a mild panic attack. For some reason, this felt far more intimate than making out in the back corner or something.  
  
Wh-why was he asleep!?! The movie wasn’t scary in the slightest, but it was incredibly entertaining in a dark humor kind of way. Zombie cats. Who wouldn’t want to watch a movie about _zombie cats!?_  
  
Shiro snorted loud enough for the whole theater to hear, and Keith had to nudge him back awake.  
  
“I-I’m so sorry!” Shiro yelped, face bright red with embarrassment as they stood outside the theater when the movie had ended. “I had been up all night studying for this test, I got maybe two hours of sleep, I just… wasn’t keeping track of the time.”  
  
“Babe, it’s okay,” Keith replied with a nonchalant shrug and a small smile. “It happens. You work hard. Maybe a little too hard. If you were tired, we could have gone out later.”  
  
Shiro gave Keith this look that he couldn’t describe other than no one had looked at him that way before.  
  
“I just... I really wanted to see you. I really like spending time with you, Keith.”  
  
Oh.  
  
It was Keith’s turn to flush crimson all the way to his ears, and he coughed into his hand to cover his face at least a little bit, unable to look at Shiro in the eyes anymore. “Shut up,” he muttered into his palm. “Don’t say embarrassing things like that, we’ve only been dating for two weeks.”  
  
Shiro chuckled, that laugh he always used when they both knew he had the upper hand. It rumbled from deep in his chest, hoarse in his throat, and never failed to make Keith’s pants a little tighter.  
  
“A-and you’re the one who said he wanted to take things slow!” Keith added, now pointing an accusing finger.  
  
“You’re so cute.”  
  
He nearly choked on his own spit. “Excuse me?”  
  
Shiro’s smiling was blinding. “You’re cute,” he repeated. “You’re really, really cute.”  
  
Keith was pretty sure people could see literal steam rising from his head in the chilled air. Higher functions had ceased because his brain had completely short circuited. It wasn’t like people hadn’t told Keith he had been cute before. Hell, that compliment was the very bane of his existence. He would never be anything other than “cute” to most people, instead of “hot” or “handsome”, he was just “cute”.  
  
But coming from _Shiro_ , “cute” felt like it meant so, so much more. Keith just wasn’t sure _why._  
  
Shiro’s smile faded. “Oh, man, did I tease you too much?”  
  
That snapped Keith back in action. “I… I didn’t say I didn’t like it,” he mumbled with a glare that probably said otherwise. Glaring tended to be his default gaze. One of his caseworkers had claimed it was a defense mechanism of his, which he couldn’t disagree with. “Anyway, I’m hungry. I want lunch.” He about-faced and went marching down the street toward the Black Lion Café, which had quickly become a favorite spot of theirs. He could brush off these dancing butterflies in his gut by ordering Lance around again. Maybe his frenemy was finally out of whatever funk he had been in for the past week.  
  
“You just had popcorn. A large tub of it!” Shiro protested, chasing after him.  
  
“Uh-huh, and now you’re buying me lunch. That’s your punishment for embarrassing me.”  
  
Don’t think for a second Keith didn’t hear that little snort from behind him. “Okay, that’s fair,” Shiro conceded with a grin that was bright enough for Keith to feel in his chest.

 

 

 

**7**  
  
They had a date at this little Italian place downtown, far enough from campus that they had to take an Uber. Keith would have taken them on his motorcycle, but even after about a dozen rides, Shiro was still hesitant to be on it. Also, Keith didn’t want to mess up his hair. He had quite a time trying to tame his “mullet” as Lance called it, screaming at Allura the whole time through video chat that he couldn’t do a damn thing with it until she suggested throwing on some paste and putting it in a ponytail. Simple is sometimes the best way to go, she had said.  
  
He hoped so because he didn’t really have anything in terms of nice clothes, y’know, like business casual stuff or semi-formal or whatever. His clothing was clean, washed regularly, no holes to speak of, but they weren’t exactly clothes you wear on a nicer date to impress your maybe-boyfriend with and hopefully take him back to your place for the night. A red plaid shirt with his nicest black slacks and boots was about as formal as he was going to get.  
  
Did he just think of Shiro as his maybe-boyfriend?  
  
He flushed a little at his own reflection while putting on some aftershave, which he hoped smelled good enough to be a distraction from his state of barely-nice dress. Those little details did matter because that was how Keith was going to lure Shiro down to the dark, cozy basement just waiting for him.  
  
Tonight was going to be it, he determined.  
  
It had to be tonight.  
  
Before he fell down this hole any further.

 

 

 

**8**  
  
Shiro felt helpless in Keith’s presence. Whatever forces were at work kept pulling him like a stupid moth toward Keith’s brilliant flame. Deep down, Shiro knew he would be burned badly if he touched that flame. That’s why he wanted to take things slow and steady. Kissing Keith the night they met had awoken things inside of him that he had buried long ago. He’d never wanted anyone so much that all of this actually frightened him a bit.  
  
Keith was… younger than what Shiro was used to. Hell, this time last year he had just started his senior year in high school. A six year age gap felt that much wider when you viewed it that way. Though, it probably didn’t matter. Keith was an adult, and if he could go to war at this age then he could…  
  
Shiro went to war at that age, after all. So the nightmares liked to remind him from time to time. Just in case he forgot. But he would never forget. His arm would make sure of that.  
  
A lot can happen in six years. A lot can happen in only three.  
  
Thirty-six months.  
  
A thousand nightmares.

 

 

 

**9**  
  
Things seemed to be getting a bit awkward now, but it wasn't really a bad feeling. More like a heavy air of uncertain anticipation. The entire ride all the way to their little round table in a romantically dim corner of the restaurant, neither of them said much of anything. Keith was strangely quiet. Now, Shiro learned that Keith was generally a quiet guy to begin with, but that was more of a contemplative kind of quiet, peaceful and content. This time, the quiet had a tension to it. Shiro couldn’t help feeling like something was wrong.  
  
“Are you feeling okay?” He asked after the waiter promised to come back with their drinks.  
  
Keith nodded.  
  
“You’re normally more talkative, at least with me."  
  
Keith squirmed a bit, and Shiro noticed that he wouldn’t look at him much, keeping those captivating indigo eyes to the side. “It’s nothing,” he said. “I’m, um… I’m just not used to this kind of atmosphere… that’s all.”  
  
Ah, that was understandable. If a little disappointing. Shiro had been the one to suggest this dinner. He thought maybe after almost three weeks, this would be a good time to step up their dating game a bit. Go somewhere really nice and maybe even a bit romantic.  
  
“Do you wanna go somewhere else?” Shiro offered. “We can if you don’t like it here.”  
  
“No!” Keith said quickly. “No, it’s fine. I do kinda like it, I’m just not used to it. It’s… it’s no big deal.”  
  
Keith was such a fascinating little creature. One minute he was teasing Shiro and acting wild. The next, he was very reserved. It was clear he loved compliments, and just as clear that he didn’t know how to take them, rendered flustered and embarrassed. He never shied away from physical contact, but never initiated it, either.  
  
“Your hair looks good,” Shiro said. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you wear a ponytail. It’s nice.”  
  
Keith’s fingers played at the strands of his ponytail a bit. “Thanks,” he mumbled. “Um… your hair looks nice, too.” And then those fingers left his ponytail to grab at the menu and hold it closer to his face than necessary.  
  
Wait, was he…  
  
Was Keith being _shy???_

“What’s so funny?” Keith snapped from behind the menu that he refused to put down when Shiro snorted into his napkin to keep from laughing outright.  
  
“Nothing,” Shiro replied, his voice betraying him as it shook a bit.  
  
“Liar, you’re laughing at me again, aren’t you!”  
  
This time, Shiro did let a few giggles escape, unable to contain them any longer.  
  
“You are laughing at me,” Keith moaned. “What is it? Is it my face? My clothes? Do I smell weird?”  
  
“No, no, you smell fine.” Now he really was laughing. Not loudly, of course, because they were in a very formal restaurant, after all. “You are just so cute.”  
  
Keith finally lowered the menu to glare at Shiro, lips pouty and eyes annoyed. “Yeah, you keep saying that,” he retorted.   
  
“I assure you, I mean it each and every time.”  
  
“Uh-huh.” The menu finally returned to the table as Keith's eyes traveled dramatically to the ceiling before returning to Shiro. “And what’s so cute about me this time?”  
  
“Where should I start?”  
  
Keith made this choking sound that just proved Shiro’s point even more. “Sh-shut up, nerd.”  
  
“Before you shove me into a locker?”  
  
Ah, there was that hint of a smile, that slight twitch on the corner of his mouth whenever Keith was struggling to not look pleased. Shiro wanted to kiss that corner. He wanted to kiss him in all kinds places. “Keep it up, hot stuff, and I just might,” Keith threatened, although his tone was far more playful than threatening.  
  
The conversation flowed through the evening as the pair relaxed back into their normal banter. The waitress presented their food, shrimp tortellini for Keith and lemon salmon for Shiro.  
  
“Oh, I’m sorry!” She exclaimed when a careless knock of her elbow sent Keith’s silverware clanging to the floor.  
  
“Hey, it’s no big deal,” he replied graciously, grabbing the utensils off the ground before she was forced to scoop them up herself. She took them from him with a few more flustered apologies, probably worried that her tip was going to take a hit for this (it wasn’t, she was a splendid waitress and only trying her best), her face turning red with embarrassment.  
  
Keith had handed her the dirty steak knife. The blade gleamed dangerously in the light from his fingers, those very same fingers that had been clutching shyly at the menu earlier. The smile he had given her seemed to match that blade, exquisite, handsome, and a little dangerous.  
  
For some reason the image of Keith holding that knife burned in Shiro’s brain as a chill ran down his spine.

 

 

 

**10**  
  
The night was still young when they left the restaurant. It was Saturday and they didn’t have anything alcoholic with their fancy dinner due to Keith not being twenty-one yet. And Keith definitely wanted to rectify that situation immediately.  
  
“A club?” Shiro gawked. The club was called The Galra, which was a rather strange name as far as he was concerned and wondered if it was supposed to actually mean anything or if the owner had just made up a word to be fake deep.  
  
“Yeah.”  
  
When Keith had said he wanted to get drunk with Shiro again, Shiro had assumed they were going to another party at Allura’s sorority. A club was different, and this one had a very large sign with "21+ Only" written in large, red letters. “But you can’t – “  
  
Keith interrupted him by reaching up to place his fingers on Shiro’s lips and flashed a card in his other hand. “I’m a special guest here. It’s fine. Trust me, they don’t give a shit so you shouldn’t, either.”  
  
They skipped the long line all the way up to the bouncer, a very massive man who was all muscle and easily twice Shiro’s size. His frown was set deep in his face, and his one eye glared enough for two. “And one guest,” Keith declared as he held up his card to this very terrifying individual. For a few moments, Shiro thought Keith was going to be smashed by this guy for trying to sneak into a twenty-one-plus night club by using a fake ID. Hell, that card didn’t even look like an ID at all!  
  
The bouncer grunted with a nod, and unchained a rope in front of a different door, the VIP door, allowing both Keith and Shiro to slip inside without any incident, at all.  
  
This was not the kind of place Shiro imagined Keith would be in, but then again, Keith was constantly surprising him. He remembered Keith telling him about how much he enjoyed quiet places. His favorite pastimes were spent outdoors, usually in his garden he had at his dad’s place or driving to wherever the road took his motorcycle or going out to the mountains to hike off trail. 

The Galra was the complete opposite of that. It was incredibly loud, the bass thumping through his feet all the way to his head, making his whole body shake. It was the kind of loud music that you had to give yourself into, otherwise the resistance would hurt like hell. Neon lights pulsed through the darkness in time with the beat. The heat was suffocating. It was chaos. Pure, lusty, human chaos.  
  
They had a table on the upper deck that overlooked the dance floor, the VIP section. Another waitress, this time scantily clad with a tight bust and an aura of professional confidence took their order… after placing a tray of shots on the table. He definitely didn’t miss the appreciative way Keith eyed her when she leaned a little farther forward than necessary to show off the goods.  
  
“You don’t like girls?” Keith asked when he caught Shiro watching him. The waitress smirked as she sashayed away with their drink order.  
  
“I like them fine,” Shiro replied. “I’m just not used to this atmosphere.”  
  
Not anymore, at least. When was the last time he had stepped foot in a club?  
  
“Ah. Well, don’t let the atmosphere fool you. The Galra is a tight ship, even though things looks so crazy. The owner is an absolute ass, but he runs a good business.”  
  
“You know the owner?”  
  
Keith took a shot. “Yeah. Kind of. His son, too. I slept with him once. The son, I mean, not the owner, gross.”  
  
“Is that how you got a VIP pass here?” Shiro couldn’t help asking. It was none of his business, absolutely not, but he just couldn’t stop his curiosity. Keith was just so… fascinating.  
  
Keith looked playfully shocked. “What? No! I would never sleep with that rat bastard for _favors!”_ He laughed as if Shiro told the most hysterical joke. “No, no, I used to work here. Last summer.” He nodded toward the floor. “I was a cage dancer.”  
  
Several cages were suspended from the ceiling, most of them encasing one or two dancers whose bodies swayed provocatively to entice the crowd in their chase for pleasure. The music and the darkness and the way Keith’s indigo eyes glimmered, nothing stopped Shiro’s imagination from conjuring a very vivid image of him as a cage dancer, moving like that, barely wearing anything as he displayed all he had to offer.  
  
Shiro swallowed. Hard.  
  
And then his brain calculated one small detail in Keith’s story.  
  
“Last summer. Wait, but you were – “  
  
“ – only seventeen,” Keith finished with a slight smirk. “I _might_ have lied about my age to get hired.” He shrugged. “Whatever, it’s not my fault they didn’t look hard enough in my background to confirm whether I was telling the truth or not. They liked what they saw when I auditioned, and so did their customers. Besides, the pay was good. My scholarship wasn’t going to kick in until I actually started college, so it was either this or McDonald’s.”  
  
“So what made you quit?”  
  
Keith’s eyes gleamed. “You almost sound disappointed.”  
  
“I’m only curious,” Shiro assured him. Maybe a little disappointed.   
  
“College. Work late at night only to go back home and study on top of that? I know you know how hard this university is. And my scholarship is only as good as my grades. If I fall behind, I lose it.”  
  
Shiro nodded. He was never going to catch up on his work, no matter how close graduation loomed.  
  
“And I met the old man by then, so he more than helps out these days. Parental guilt pays pretty damn good, too.”  
  
Keith laughed again, but his eyes were no longer lit up. They were black now, almost as black as the darkness between each neon flash around them.  
  
“I want to dance,” Keith said suddenly after another shot.  
  
Shiro didn’t protest, at all.

 

 

 

**11**  
  
Shiro could definitely see why Keith was chosen to be a cage dancer.  
  
Watching Keith was like… watching sex. Not actual porn but like… if sensuality had a form, the way he moved would be it. The way his hips swayed, round and round, hypnotized him. The fluid roll of his body from hips to torso and back down again. He rocked to the rhythm as if he was part of the music itself, a living embodiment of the lyrics that repeated all around Shiro.  
  
_Keep playing my heart strings, faster and faster…_  
  
They went back and forth between the bar for drinks, short breathers at their table, and the floor again. Soon, Shiro’s head was swimming, and then shortly after, he was drowning. Keith was dragging him down into the depths where that dark thing that Shiro had buried started swimming up to meet them.  
  
Shiro gripped Keith’s ass as the other gyrated against him, almost desperately, like a lifeline despite being the one responsible for pushing him under. “Oh, baby,” Keith gasped into his ear that went straight to those dark places. He moaned when Shiro ground against him, hard, no longer caring about the dance or whoever saw. It was too dark in here, anyway, and the crowd brushing up on them were far too gone in their own chase for pleasure.  
  
If Keith kept grinding into him like that, Shiro was going to reach the point of no return and he made no move to stop him. His face lowered into Keith’s neck, inhaling the musk he wore mixed with sweat and natural body odor. He felt so lithe and small in his arms, but hard with carefully toned muscle. Keith seemed so slight, and yet could keep up with Shiro easily. His tongue darted out to lick the sweat off the pale skin, and Keith shivered.  
  
“Shiro,” he breathed, so quiet and yet so much clearer than the lyrics that repeated over and over in Shiro’s head despite the far different song currently playing.  
  
Faster and faster…  
  
“Shiro, baby, I need you. Oh, God, I want you so bad.”  
  
Keith grabbed Shiro’s face to kiss him hard, his hunger apparent as he shoved his tongue between Shiro’s teeth. Shiro’s left hand slipped through the waistband of Keith’s pants and briefs to grip his ass bare. Keith whimpered, running his hands up Shiro’s chest, unbuttoning his shirt along the way. All Shiro could think about was how much Keith clearly desired him. When was the last time he had been wanted like this? Definitely not since he had been released from the hospital.  
  
“Come back to my place,” Keith begged into his mouth. “Come to bed with me. I need you. I need you to fuck me.”  
  
Shiro, gently, tenderly, pushed Keith away. Shiro's shirt was mostly unbuttoned, and Keith's ponytail was a mess, and they were both breathing hard, and their skin gleamed with sweat. And, oh, Keith, his face was red like his plaid shirt, and his expression was this heartbreaking combination of desire and confusion.  
  
“Keith,” he said and he decided the easiest way would be to rip off the bandaid instead of slowly peeling it away, “I _can’t._ I… I’m not ready for that, yet.”  
  
Six years ago, Shiro would have definitely taken Keith up on his offer (pretending in this hypothetical scenario that Keith was also eighteen). And if we’re being very honest here, they wouldn’t even make it as far as Keith’s house; Shiro would have taken him against the wall in the VIP section, hard and fast and not giving a damn if anyone saw. Or, even better, if Keith shoved _him_ up against the wall, taking Shiro for everything he had. There was a dark hunger behind those eyes of his, ready to pounce if only Shiro would just willingly drop his guard. The desire in Shiro growled from those dark depths, and Shiro just fucking _needed_ to sink down there clinging to Keith before he died from this longing. 

And that was precisely why Shiro just...

He just... _couldn't._

Six years ago, Shiro was an entirely different person. One who partied and worked out a lot because his job was a dangerous one where a death before he would reach thirty was hightly likely. Every week, there was this list of names of those from all branches who had perished in the line of duty. Some of those names Shiro recognized. A couple of them had faces he actually remembered before they were deployed never to be seen again. How long would it be before Shiro’s name would also be on that list? His last deployment hadn’t been his first, but it might have been his luckiest all things considering. That day, the job had only wanted his arm (and subsequently his peace of mind), but not his life.  
  
He didn’t want to take anything for granted like that ever again.  
  
This young man standing before him, so fascinating and fun and handsome and everything Shiro could ever need. Shiro did not want to take Keith for granted. He wanted Keith, his body literally ached for Keith, but he wanted something more.  
  
“I get it,” Keith said, straightening his shirt. “It’s fine.” He was shutting Shiro out. Shiro could feel the distance suddenly widening between them. When Keith spoke in short sentences like that, it meant he was guarding himself again, not letting anything in.  
  
“Keith.”  
  
“I said it’s fine. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have pushed like that, anyway. It’s my bad. Let’s just forget about it and go home.”

 

 

 

**12**  
  
The Uber driver who picked them up from the club was the very same person who had dropped them off at the restaurant. The ride to the restaurant had been awkward in shy, exciting kind of way. The tension had been due to anticipation.  
  
Now it was just awkward. Keith sat as far from Shiro as the backseat would allow, as if touching him in the slightest would breach the promise between them. Shiro couldn’t help feeling a little guilty for letting things get to this point. He shouldn’t have let himself get carried away. He shouldn’t have teased Keith like that.  
  
“I’m sorry,” he said again when the Uber dropped Keith off first.  
  
“It’s fine,” Keith repeated. “You have nothing to be sorry about. I’ll text you later.”  
  
Shiro stepped forward for a hug, at least, but Keith immediately went up the porch and inside his house, the screen door slamming so hard behind him that it bounced off the frame a few times before settling back down where it belonged.  
  
Shiro made sure to give the poor driver who had to be an unwilling witness to this mess a very good tip.

 

 

 

**13**

This close!

This! Fucking! CLOSE!

Tomato, the red-orange tabby cat who had decided to live here instead of the street shortly after Keith had moved in, stared at him curiously after he had entered the house so violently. She mewed, then jumped to the floor and headed for the kitchen, flicking her short tail to inform her owner that she could see the bottom of her bowl and therefore starvation was imminent. 

Keith would top her food in a minute, after he had calmed down. 

What had gone wrong? Did Shiro actually not want him? How the fuck was Keith supposed to bring him here if that were the case? 

Keith had never been so _embarrassed._  
  
Ever.  
  
He slid to the floor and buried his face in his knees, struggling to keep from crying from sheer humiliation. No, he knew. He knew precisely what had gone wrong. He was such an idiot. Stupid, stupid.

It wasn’t that Shiro’s rejection angered him, it had been his own behavior that he couldn’t believe. He'd pushed, that's what happened. Shiro had told him from the beginning he wanted to go slow, and Keith pushed anyway. That was the whole reason he brought Shiro to the Galra to begin with. And then, he pushed too much and ended up pushing Shiro away instead. He fucked up everything. Fucked it up big time. It hurt. It really, in his chest, hurt. 

He felt so empty.  
  
As empty as the dark basement down below.

How was he going to recover from this? 

 

**14**  
  
Keith didn’t text Shiro for the rest of the night. He didn’t text him all day Sunday, either. The following Monday, Shiro didn’t show up at their little group gathering the student lounge. Well, the only people there were Pidge and Hunk, meaning Keith wasn’t the only one having relationship issues (whatever was going on between Lance and Allura was escalating and no longer restricted to just drinking. Pidge said Allura was at a “sorority function” and if that were truth, Keith would eat his left boot). Keith listened to Pidge and Hunk talk nerd stuff about one of the classes they had together, although he was too miserable to actually attempt to understand what they were saying.  
  
“Oh, boy, another one,” Hunk remarked, both he and Pidge staring at Keith.  
  
“Hm?” Keith muttered absentmindedly, staring at a particularly interesting tree outside the window.  
  
“See what I mean?”  
  
“Yup,” Pidge said with a sigh. “The Therapy Squad never rests.”  
  
“Ain’t that the truth.” They exchanged a high five.  
  
“Like, we’re so caught up in everyone else’s problems, nobody knows we’re dating,” Pidge added.  
  
Hunk laughed. “Right? I guess we’re just not dysfunctional enough to get noticed.”  
  
“Wait, what?” Keith choked, tearing his gaze back to his friends. “You two are dating!?”  
  
“We’ve been dating!” Pidge shot back. “Good God, we’ve been together since before Halloween and not a damn one of you people noticed because you’re all too caught up in your own drama.”  
  
“I actually think I told Lance like five times, and he’s forgotten each and every time,” Hunk added, with a click of his tongue and a shake of his head. “Poor lovesick bastard.”  
  
“Well, Keith, maybe if things aren’t working out between you and Shiro, maybe you can take Lance out and the both of you can like heal each other or something weird like that. Then we'll all be at peace."   
  
“Lance and I already tried that in high school, we lasted a week,” Keith deadpanned back.  
  
Pidge peered at him. “Was it one of those things where you told the whole school you were dating for the hell of it, called each other like once, and then ignored each other the rest of the time?”  
  
It was exactly like that, actually, but Keith didn’t say so and he didn’t need to.  
  
“So what happened between you and Shiro?” Hunk prodded. “You actually seemed legit happy these past few weeks, and now you’re all mopey and, yeah, you’re pretty much acting like yourself again.”  
  
“I’m not this bad,” Keith protested. “Am I?”  
  
“You can get pretty mopey,” Pidge pointed out with a nod.  
  
Keith groaned, sliding down in his chair. “You guys don’t have to play Dear Abbie with me, it’s no big deal. Besides, I know you’re busy dealing with Lance and Allura.”  
  
“Oh my God, PLEASE give us a break from that mess, we’ll take anything else!” Hunk begged. “I’ve tried everything to distract Lance from his heartbreak. I even offered up my own body as a sacrifice, and I’d be lying if I said it didn’t sting a little bit that he didn’t take me up on it. I would’ve taken very good care of him.”  
  
“It’s only because he doesn’t deserve you,” Pidge assured him, patting his arm. “It’s okay, baby, you got me now.”  
  
‘Baby’ coming out of Pidge’s mouth sounded so out of character, even though she made it sound more ironic than affectionate. How the hell had Keith not noticed she and Hunk were together?  
  
Oh, right.  
  
He had been busy killing people.  
  
“Y’know, I was going to set him up with Shiro before Allura got hooked you two up instead,” Hunk continued. “I kinda resent you a little bit for that.”  
  
“Well, he might be available now,” Keith replied, and he’d meant to sound nonchalant about the whole thing, but the words came out very soft and regretful.  
  
Pidge and Hunk exchanged glances. “So you guys did break up?” Hunk asked.  
  
“We haven’t talked in a few days.”  
  
Now, the pair looked completely deflated and unimpressed. “Seriously?” Pidge groaned. “Then just talk to him.”  
  
“If it were that easy, hun, we wouldn’t be dealing with this,” Hunk pointed out.  
  
“And then you two wouldn’t be dating,” Keith added.  
  
“Oh, yeah, that’s true,” Hunk nodded. “At least one thing good is coming out of this, right, my love?”  
  
“Please don’t call me that in public.”  
  
“Okay, I will.”  
  
“Ew.” Her nose crinkled in absolute disgust, but her amber eyes danced with playful glee.  
  
So this was how nerds flirted. Keith snorted. They were actually pretty cute, a good pair. Shiro teased him like that, too, and Keith realized he missed that already. He didn’t want to let this go. Whatever it was he had with Shiro. At least, not so easily. He wanted to make this work. Like actually make this work. Not to just lure him into his basement. The basement was taking a backseat to a bigger priority now: seeing how far he could go with this.  
  
Keith didn’t believe in Divine Intervention but neither did he believe in coincidences, and that it was that precise moment when he came to this conclusion about Shiro that his phone dinged with a text notification. Fate. That’s what it was he believed in. Fate. He believed in that shit very, very strongly. 

 

> **Space Nerd - 8:22 am:**  
>  _I’m sorry I haven’t spoken to you lately. I have an exam this week that I’ve been working my ass off on. Also, I know I upset you a lot last Saturday and I wanted give you your space. I really don’t want to mess this up with you. I’ll call you later if that’s okay. :)_

Things just don’t work out. 

  
But sometimes they do.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter art by [boredbeingregular](https://boredbeingregular.tumblr.com/post/165424020225/my-peice-for-the-sheithbigbang-i-was-paired-the)~


	3. Part 3

**1**  
  
_“Thank you, Bob. Well, it’s been almost a month and still no word on the case of Chris Haynes’ disappearance. The sophomore of Roan County University is the sixth missing person’s case ever since this past May. Police suspect that this could possibly be the work of a serial killer, however, no bodies have been discovered. Sheriff Dunning urges all citizens to keep a look out for their families and loved ones and for anything suspicious…”_

 

**2**  
  
“Scary stuff, ain’t it?” Hunk remarked with a gulp, watching the news playing on the TV. Almost all the students in the lounge had gathered to watch the seventy-inch flat-screen on the wall at this side of the room. The summer disappearances had been quite the talk of campus, rumors and speculations flying, and criminal justice majors trying to flex their skills of deduction to pinpoint what really might be going on and if there was anyone responsible.  
  
“Seems a little irresponsible to blame it on a serial killer,” Lance remarked as he chewed gum. “Especially since there aren’t any bodies that proves they’re dead to begin with. Won’t that just make people panic?”  
  
“It's the news, what would you expect?” Keith pointed out. “Sensationalism is what gets you ratings. It’s boring to say that people around the county are disappearing and the police have no idea what to do about it. Panic is exciting.”  
  
“I guess…”  
  
“Also, people don’t just disappear like that,” Pidge remarked. “The victims are all random and not really connected to each other except in the geographical area they live in. They all wouldn’t decide to just leave the county without telling anyone. A serial killer makes a lot of sense. Or a cult?”    
  
“Or aliens,” Keith said with a grin.  
  
“Yeah, definitely aliens.” Pidge nodded, and not sarcastic, either.  
  
“Aaaaaand that’s enough insane conspiracy theories for me for one morning,” Lance announced, standing up and grabbing his backpack. “I’m gonna grab a bagel before class. You comin’, Hunk?”  
  
“Sure!”  
  
Lance seemed to be doing better. Maybe because Thanksgiving break was close, and he was going back with Hunk to their hometown in California to hang out with their families. “You’re not going with them?” Keith asked Pidge.  
  
“And skip out of my own family gathering, are you nuts?” she replied, eyes wide with shock at the very thought. “Besides, the world’s a lot smaller these days, and social media is a huge part of the dating scene. Hunk and I can still talk whenever we feel like. Also, it’s just a weekend, it’s not gonna to kill us if we don’t see each other for four days, yeesh.”

 

 

 

**3**

"So, I've decided to go home for Thanksgiving."

Shiro said this while warming his hand with a cup of hot chocolate, and Keith munched on his nachos. The noise of the amusement park had long faded to the background, for the way Shiro announced this made it sound like it had been a rather large decision he had to make. 

"You don't seem too thrilled about that," Keith pointed out. 

"I haven't seen my family much this past year. Didn't really talk to them, either." 

"Really? Why?" 

And Shiro looked so vulnerable right then. Keith would never forget that look. The way he stared into his cocoa. Looking so much younger than he was. And yet so much older at the same time. 

"Ever since my surgery... I dunno. Everything feels so different. They look at me different." 

His gaze went to his prosthetic then, the hand that didn't need to be warmed by a mug of hot cocoa in the frigid air. Keith wondered if maybe Shiro was being a little paranoid. Then again, who was he to talk, the kid who had been abandoned by his parents when he was a helpless baby and needed them the most. Things just don't work out, and parents can be absolute selfish assholes. 

But maybe that wasn't true for Shiro's parents. 

"Hey, you wanna come with me?" 

Keith stared, startled, a tortilla chip dripping with cheese. His friends had invited him to spend the holidays with their own families, and sometimes he would go. But coming from Shiro felt different. Incredibly touching. 

"I think my folks would really like you. Especially my kid brother." 

"You have a brother?" 

"Yeah, Ryou." Shiro grinned. "People keep thinking we're twins, but we're a few years apart." 

"Soooo," Keith drawled out, "You want me to go meet and spend time with your family, specifically with a _younger_ version of you."

"He's not a nerd, though. He works on cars."

"Hot."

Shiro pouted.

"Oh, don't give me that face. What did you think was gonna happen when you started tempting me with your hot younger brother who isn't a nerd?" 

"But I thought you liked nerds..." Then Shiro chuckled, and Keith would never tire of that sound. "So how about it? You wanna come with?" 

It's not that Keith didn't want to go. He surprised himself with how much he wanted to say "yes" and he almost did right then and there. 

"I'm sorry, Shiro. ...I can't." 

Shiro's smile faltered in a way that made Keith immediately want to take his response back. But he remained silent, and Shiro's smile returned, though it didn't quite reach his eyes. "It's okay, I understand. Meeting the family might be a little too much right now, wouldn't it?" 

"...yeah."

But not really. Because that wasn't the problem. 

Parents fawning over their estranged son finally come home. After spending so much money to heal him, give him back some semblance of a normal life. Calling him daily. Trying to maintain contact with him. Trying to stay a part of his life.

Keith couldn't relate.

And he would rather not see it for himself.   


 

**4**  
  
Keith never cared for Thanksgiving. Or family holiday gatherings for that matter. He’d feel lonely without his friends sometimes, but one weekend by himself wasn’t gonna kill him. And like Pidge had said, social media closed the distance. He could always talk to people online, and he did. Especially Shiro.   
  
It’s just a weekend. That’s what Pidge had said. Four days apart wasn’t going to kill them.  
  
But when you are in the phase of the relationship where everything is still so new that you haven’t quite figured out what to call it, four days might as well be an eternity.  
  
Four days to himself was something Keith used to welcome, especially given the constant socializing he did on campus with his little group that refused to be apart between classes and Allura’s sorority parties. He could tend to his garden outside, play with his cat, binge a few trending Netflix series to see if they were worth the hype, read some of the books that have been sitting untouched on his bookshelf long after he had bought them. And he, Lance, and Hunk were still up for some online FPS this long weekend when they were released from their families for the night. Evil aliens weren’t going to shoot themselves in the face. Then, there was the rabbit hole Keith could always lose himself in for a few hours on the latest creepypasta and alien conspiracy articles written by his favorite blogs.  
  
Plenty to do.  
  
He did none of it. Well, he did play with Lance and Hunk, but he couldn't really concentrate.   
  
Four days and his mind could only focus on one thing: Shiro.  
  
Shiro, Shiro, Shiro…  
  
Keith often found himself checking his phone impatiently for any new messages or phone calls. He was incredibly tempted to send Shiro a bunch of a texts to grab his attention, thumb even hovering over the keypad. No, no, that would be way too needy, such behavior never went well and always creeped out the receiver. He was doing it again. Being pushy. Risking pushing Shiro too much until he was literally pushed out of his life. Besides, Shiro would definitely be busy, occupied with dealing with his own family.  
  
Instead, Keith went into his gallery to look at all the pictures of Shiro on his phone. His particular favorite was a selfie they had taken together at the amusement park. That was a group outing, all their friends had come with, too (now that Keith thought about it, Pidge and Hunk really were joined at the hip that entire day, weren’t they? Even Lance and Allura seemed to have forgotten whatever they were going through to have a good time together, like nothing had changed between them). Keith and Shiro were standing in front of this massive roller coaster with triple loops called Kerberos they had just finished riding, Keith’s hair and Shiro’s white frock completely messed up and wind blown. Shiro had to hold the phone because his arms were longer and could better capture the two of them and Kerberos behind them. Keith was hugging him tightly. Shiro’s face was red from the chill and wind, and the picture did an amazing job capturing the brightness of his eyes and his smile. Keith could remember feeling Shiro’s body thrumming against him, feel his heart pounding in his chest and every nerve pulsing. The thrill of the ride had brought his whole body to life, and Keith could feel it. It was funny to Keith how this guy clearly loved crazy roller coasters but was terrified of riding on his motorcycle.  
  
(“Don’t be silly. Roller coasters and thrill rides have safety harnesses. Your motorcycle doesn’t.”  
  
“I wouldn’t have let you fall!”  
  
“Wait, are you jealous of a roller coaster?”  
  
“….No.”  
  
“You are!”  
  
“Sh-shut up, nerd. Buy me nachos.”)  
  
That had been a good day. That had been a really, really good day.  
  
Keith fell over on the couch, still gazing at that picture on his phone, still reliving that day over and over. Something had been in the air that day, something good, not just the excellent weather. Something that made them all have nothing but a great time together.  
  
He didn’t want to spend four days alone, specifically without Shiro. Pidge had been wrong, social media only made the distance between him and Shiro feel all that bigger right now. He wanted to see Shiro, desperately. He wanted to hold him and feel his heartbeat beneath his ear, feel the warmth of that body. He wanted nothing more than to live in that moment captured by this pic forever.  
  
An idea came to Keith, making him sit up quickly. Then he was looking up the holiday hours of a local printer.  
  


 

**5**  

> **Space Nerd:** OMG I finally got a bit of freedom!

 

It was like a dam of communication had burst open after that first day of being apart. 

 

> **Hellcat:** How’s the family?  
>    
>  **Space Nerd:** Lmao all over me. My mom is being extra clingy too. Oh and my younger brother’s getting married!  
>    
>  **Hellcat:** Oh shit whaddup  
>  **  
> ** **Space Nerd:** …
> 
> **Space Nerd:** Nobody says that anymore Keith.  
>    
>  **Hellcat:** Says u old man  
>  **  
> ** **Space Nerd:** Respect your elders.  
>    
>  **Hellcat:** :P Never  
>    
>  **Space Nerd:** :P :P :P :P :P :P :P :P  
>    
>  **Hellcat:** Real mature. Much worthy of my respect  
>    
>  **Space Nerd:** Good.
> 
>  

Keith tapped his foot against the wall, lying in bed, watching the three “…” jump up and down on his screen as Shiro was typing out an additional message. 

>   **Space Nerd:** So how’s your Thanksgiving? Going anywhere?  
>    
>  **Hellcat:** Nah. Holidays are like the one time I get to be by myself. College is so hectic.  
>    
>  **Space Nerd:** I hear ya. I’m not big on family gatherings either. I like something small and not a big deal. Maybe spend that private time with someone special and no one else.

  
Keith’s face went warm. He wasn’t sure what he was getting so embarrassed about over a general text message. Someone special didn’t necessarily mean _him_ or anything. They were just dating. Things were a little more serious now, but they weren’t that serious.  
  
And Keith was still trying to get Shiro into his house so he can kill him. That's all this boiled down to.

 

 

 

**6**  
  
There were moments when Shiro would be silent on social media, which meant that his family had all of his attention. But when he was active, he was very active. The notifications wouldn’t stop blinking on Keith’s phone, mostly from Shiro. They talked well into the night about all kinds of things: the sorry state of the world, cats, favorite video games (turned out they were both crazy about multiplayer FPS), the latest memes that Shiro made Keith swear to never tell Lance that Shiro knew about them, more cats, and sometimes Shiro would get really drunk and rattle on about politics after getting into a heated debate with his father who had a radically different viewpoint on the state of society.  
  
During those quiet moments, Keith would be alone with his thoughts, Tomato sprawled lazily over his lap.  
  
Sometimes, he would glance over at his lonely basement door.  
  
It had been a while since he had brought a friend down there. Maybe that was for the best. If the police thought the disappearances were over, then he could take a bit of a breather. Relax for once.  
  
To be fair, murder relaxed him. It was cathartic, really. And Shiro would make a good kill.  
  
Perhaps the best kill.  
  
Keith stared up at his new ceiling, imagining Shiro captured forever just like that. Of course, Shiro probably won’t smile when he died, they never did. Murder wasn’t exactly fun for the victim like it was fun for Keith. They usually cried or fought back.  
  
Shiro would fight back. Maybe Keith would let him think he had the upper hand, too, for a bit. He could imagine those massive arms trying to push him off, pin him down, struggling against the hand of Death coming for him. And what exactly could he do with that prosthetic of his? Keith quivered in excitement thinking about it.  
  
His phone buzzed.

> **Space Nerd:** Check this out this is hysterical!

  
  
Keith clicked on the link, and a video filled his screen.  
  
He sat up with a quickness, typing furiously.

> **Hellcat:** Shiro WTF?????  
>    
>  **Space Nerd:** AHAHAHA!!!  
>    
>  **Hellcat:** THAT’S MESSED UP!  
>    
>  **Space Nerd:** But it’s funny. ;3c

No, Keith had never wanted to see Elmo in that context. Ever.

> **Hellcat:** Don’t make an evil cat face at me!
> 
> **Hellcat:** U hang around Lance too much. Did he send u that?
> 
> **Hellcat:** Srsly Shiro u make me wanna kill u sometimes

Keith knew Shiro wasn’t being serious with the following reply, part of that gallows humor he liked to use more often than a healthy person probably should, and yet it made Keith’s heart leap into his throat all the same:

> **Space Nerd:** Pls do.

 

 

 

**7**

  
While he didn't care for Thanksgiving whatsoever, Keith liked Christmas.  
  
Maybe not so much the actual holiday or the whole gathering of family aspect (except for his group of friends but that was different and way more fun), but he liked the energy in the frigid air. He liked the special foods you could only eat this time of year and not feel weird about it, he liked watching the Christmas specials on TV that he used to watch when he was little, he liked the moment their pumpkin overlords were blown of their thrones by the winds of minter. Allura had introduced him to the darker aspects of this time of year, too, Yule, where the cold and dark created many an inspiration for ghost stories as if Halloween had come back around for one last visit before the year ended.  
  
The parties had a different charge to them, too, with all the lights and the garland and the ugly sweaters. Allura’s sorority especially went all out for the holidays. A massive, authentic tree stood in the common room with piles of random presents strewn about its feet to be handed out at random to the party goers when they left. Keith had been displaced as the reigning keg stand champion, but that was fine, he was kinda over that kind of attention, anyway. Besides, their new champion Shiro would always give him a small kiss after doing another awe-inspiring stand, swaying a little on his feet and wearing a lopsided grin, so who was still winning here?  
  
About ten minutes later, natured called and Keith went to go drain the lizard only to find Pidge standing in front of the bathroom door looking incredibly worried. “Pidge? You okay?”  
  
“I’m fine, but Allura’s in there,” Pidge replied quietly, biting her lip a little. “She’s crying. She won’t stop.”  
  
Keith sighed. “Um… Allura doesn’t handle Christmas very well. It’s a rough time for her.” The holidays had always reminded Allura of how alone she was. Keith absolutely understood.  
  
Although he had a feeling this year was being particularly unkind to her. Two years ago, she had been with Lance and went to California to meet his family and apparently had the time of her life. So her Instagram had made it seem. Keith knew he definitely had not seen her smile like that, not even for pictures, whenever this season swallowed her up in a dark cloud. Either she had gotten better at lying, or she had found something that year. Something she didn’t have anymore. Something that she had to let go of when she graduated that following spring.   
  
“You should talk to her,” Pidge said. “You’re her closest friend. I can’t get her to open up like you can.”  
  
“I can try. I’m not that good at opening her up, either. Allura is… y’know… she doesn’t talk unless she wants to and no one can make her.”  
  
“Something wrong?” Shiro asked, poking his head around the corner, and Pidge immediately grabbed his arm.  
  
“Tell you about it in a minute. In the meantime, you’re my beer pong partner, and if Lance beats us again, I’ll frickin' poop my pants. Good luck, Keith!” And she dragged a confused Shiro away, leaving Keith alone with Allura.  
  
“Hey,” Keith called softly, lightly rapping his knuckles on the door. “Allura? You okay in there?”  
  
He heard water run from the faucet and some splashing, meaning she was washing up, most likely trying to wash away the evidence of her crying. “Sorry, I’ll be out in a second!” she called, the slight crack in her voice betraying the forced cheer. “Man, Hunk’s chili sauce is absolutely divine but it just goes right through me, I swear!”  
  
“That’s gross, Allura.”  
  
“It’s perfectly natural!”  
  
Keith didn’t budge when she opened the door. Despite how meticulously she must have washed her face and get her makeup back to normal, her eyes were still rather puffy and red around the edges. It made her sky blue irises particularly vivid in contrast. She’d definitely been crying and majorly so. Given how she prided herself at being the heart and soul of her sorority parties, it must have been a particularly big deal for her to abandon her duties and lock herself in the bathroom.  
  
“Did something happen?”  
  
“No.”  
  
The thing about being a horrible liar was that they were even incapable of lying to other horrible liars. And they both knew it. She sighed. “Fine. I’ll tell you. But not here. And not without the others. They need to hear this, too. I just… needed a moment to gather my thoughts. I don’t know how I’ll be able to word this without causing you all even more worry. Especially… “ She trailed off, inspecting her nails without actually looking at them.  
  
“Lance?”  
  
Keith didn’t even have to bring up his name to know he was right. Lance wasn't really the source of what had been bothering her or why she was crying she was crying now, but he was certainly a complication she had not been expecting.  
  
“You need to make a decision, Allura. Dangling in front of him like this is torturing both of you.” Keith now led her away from the bathroom where someone else will no doubt interrupt them to use it, taking her to one of the balconies with his hand on the small of her back. There were a couple of people out here, chatting happily over their beers and sodas, but there was plenty of space for the two of them to talk quietly.  
  
“It’s not my decision to make,” she replied. “I don’t have a choice. Coran had done all that he could, but it’s not enough. They have to have me.”  
  
“Then just take Lance with you. He’ll be the over the moon!”  
  
She glared at him. “Don’t you think I haven’t thought of that!” she hissed. “It’s not like I’m moving to a different state or even across the country, Keith, I’m going back home! To New Zealand! We... we’re not even married, he can’t just come with me to a whole new country and just stay there. He’ll need to apply for a visa, and then he’d have to drop out of this college. He’s here on a scholarship for this specific school, he can’t just switch. And while I’d absolutely would pay for his tuition elsewhere, technically this money isn’t even mine to with as I please. And…”  
  
Her lip quivered, on the verge of tears again. Keith nodded for her to continue, simply listening to her. How long had she been keeping all this bottled in? This was Allura, so of course, it must have been for a long, long time. And now she couldn't hold it in, anymore.   
  
“It’s such a huge commitment. We’re both still so young. What if things don’t work out? What if five, ten years down the road we become two entirely different people who are no longer compatible. All of that work to stay together would have been for nothing.” She hugged herself. The thick pink sweater she wore looked cozy and warm yet she seemed cold. I broke up with Lance shortly after last Christmas because I saw how close he was with his family when he took me to visit them. I knew Coran was having issues with the Board even back then. I knew something was going to have to give, and that going back home was not only inevitable but in the very near future. And I couldn’t… I couldn’t take Lance away from them. It’s so far away. It would kill him.”  
  
“To be fair,” Keith interjected softly, “you’re kinda killing him now.”  
  
She laughed, and there was no heart in it. “I’m just a silly foreign girl. He’ll be over me soon enough once I’m actually gone.”  
  
Keith had spent the past year avoiding the fallout of Lance and Allura not because he didn’t care, he cared about them both, greatly, but because he had no idea how to fix this. He’d never been in this situation. He had no idea what to say to comfort her.  
  
He swallowed, and there was an odd knot in his throat growing tighter.  
  
“And… and I don’t want to leave any of you!”  
  
Allura did burst into fresh tears then and threw her arms around Keith, and the whole balcony went quiet. “You were my first friend in this country,” she whimpered, shivering so hard that he felt like he had to hold her just to keep her from literally shaking to pieces. “And then I met Lance and the others and even Shiro… all of you have become so precious to me.”  
  
Keith looked up to see that they weren’t alone. Pidge, Hunk, Shiro… Lance… they all stood by the pair now. Pidge had tears streaming from her face, her tiny arm around an openly sobbing Hunk.  
  
“Um…” Lance spoke up, his voice cracking around a clearly constricted throat and he looked like he was struggling not to burst. He cleared his throat, took a deep breath. “Yeah, would you kindly unwind your arms from around my girl?”  
  
“No,” Keith deadpanned, and tightened his grip around Allura. She made this sound into his shoulder like a snort.  
  
“Shiro, your boyfriend is outta control,” Lance snapped, and then when Shiro just shrugged, “That’s not something you should shrug at!”  
  
With a small laugh, and this time there was some heart in it, Allura stepped away from Keith. She didn’t even flinch when Lance immediately put his arms around her shoulders. In fact, she leaned back into him, relaxed, like she was meant to be there. “I apologize for not telling you all that I planned on leaving sooner. I didn’t know how to bring it up, especially without knowing for sure when I would be going.”  
  
“I kinda knew,” Lance added. “She actually told me when her uncle had called her. And then we sorta had a fight about it.”  
  
So that’s why Lance had been so mopey a couple of weeks ago.  
  
“That fight was a bit of an eye-opener,” Allura added, taking one of Lance’s hands in hers. “Even if I was a too stubborn to admit it at the time.”  
  
“Fighting with Lance brings that out of people since he’s also very bullheaded,” Keith replied and stuck out his tongue at Lance’s indignant “Hey!”  
  
“So are you really going back?” Hunk asked, after blowing his nose into the napkin Pidge had given him.  
  
Allura nodded. “My uncle, Coran, currently runs my father’s business but he called a few weeks ago and, well, he really needs me there.”  
  
“New Zealand is so far away,” Pidge remarked, choking up a little. “Will you ever come back?”  
  
“I don’t know,” Allura admitted in quiet voice. “I want to come back, I don’t even want to leave to begin with. But if I don’t go back, everything my father had tried to build while he was alive could be squandered. Maybe even destroyed. I am to leave this summer. This party was supposed to be my last big Christmas celebration with all of you. I guess it hit me harder than I realized it would.”  
  
“His company sounds like a huge deal,” Hunk said. “But no matter what decision you make, we’ve got your back, princess. No matter how far away you go, you’re our campus princess, and we’ll always be here for you.”  
  
Allura smiled brightly, eyes swimming with tears. “Thank you, Hunk.” Then she blinked in realization. “Oh, but, it’s not a company. My family runs a chunk of the underworld trade, and we have a monopoly on seeds from a certain species of poppy, _papaver juniferum_ to be precise. We’ve genetically engineered and cultivated the species ourselves. Their street name is juniberries. Cute name, isn’t it? They're quite popular, and have many medicinal benefits. But because they only grow in our greenhouses, many different, shady types of people are trying to get a hold of them."   
  
Five mouths dropped open with shock. Staring. Staring into that adorable smile and sparkling gaze.  
  
“So, um, Lance,” Hunk began, “how does it feel knowing you are dating the daughter of an opium crimelord?”  
  
“Ummmmm…” Lance glanced at Allura, who smiled sweetly up at him, and back at Hunk, eyes as wide as saucers. “…that’s kinda… hot?”

 

 

 

**8**  
  
The Christmas party had winded down. Most people stumbled back to their dorms or up the stairs into bedrooms as the faintest blue lined the horizon. A pretty piano version of "Greensleeves" played softly on the stereo that Lance and Allura slowly swayed in front of, his arms around her waist, her head buried in his shoulder, so intimate and so in love despite their very uncertain future.  
  
She had told them she had just been kidding about being an heiress to the New Zealand mafia, that it really was just a family business ordeal and absolutely nothing illegal happening here (though Hunk commented that she had been oddly specific for just joking around). And Keith could see in her eyes that she hadn’t been kidding. All bullshit aside (excuses, not bullshit, her worries were not bullshit but they were excuses), what it boiled down to was that she was worried for Lance’s safety, that her identity was going to get him killed one day. And it very likely would. She had broken up with him because she didn’t want him hurt for “business”.  
  
Keith could get that. He really could.  
  
“You look at those two a lot,” Shiro joked as he sat down beside Keith on the bottom few stairs. “Eggnog?”  
  
“This shit’s gross,” Keith muttered but took the cup of eggnog anyway. Then he shrugged. “Allura and I have known each other for about six years now. It’ll suck seeing her leave. And Lance might be a complete dumbass, but I don’t think he doesn’t deserve her.”  
  
“I don’t know either of them very well, but I think they’re going to be okay,” Shiro said.  
  
Keith took a sip of his eggnog (this shit really was gross) and then drummed his nails against the cup. “Allura and I… we get along so well because we’re alike. When we talked to each other that first time, when she was assigned to be my mentor, we realized our lives and experiences are kinda parallel. It was almost scary. My parents leave me to the system, my dad suddenly comes back in my life long enough to give me a house only to disappear again just as mysteriously. Her father’s killed and she’s sent to hide in another country. It’s a weird way to connect with someone, but that’s what we did.”  
  
“Do you see us in them?”  
  
Keith stared at Shiro. “Us? Like _us_ us?”  
  
“Is there another us?”  
  
“I guess not,” Keith snorted. “But yeah, I guess I kinda do. Allura and I are a pair of messed up people getting involved with sweet dudes we probably don’t deserve. Not that Lance is sweet or anything, but you on the other hand.”  
  
“I dunno, I’m pretty messed up, too. Everyone has their skeletons packed in some dark closet. Or a full basement even.”  
  
Keith choked on his eggnog.  
  
“You alright?”  
  
“I’m fine,” Keith gasped. “I just never heard it put that way before.”  
  
Shiro grinned. Then curled his hand into a paw and placed it just over his chin.  
  
“You can’t evil cat face in real life!”

 

 

 

**9**  
  
“I’m going to… stay with Lance.”  
  
Allura stared down at her coffee and was actually waiting for Lance to be free from his shift. Lance was all but dancing around behind the counter with a wide smile that would never leave his face, except to glare at Keith sitting next to “his girl”. Every time he did, Keith would glare back and pointedly scoot his chair a few inches closer to Allura just to infuriate him. Allura always noticed and rolled her eyes at the both of them.  
  
Keith figured she was going to stay with him. It wasn’t like she had been trying very hard to stay away from him in the first place, even hanging out with the same group of friends. But he sipped his peppermint mocha and kept his thoughts to himself. Despite her behavior, the decision must have been hard on her. Then again, she was a person of practicality over emotions. Being with her, the daughter of a crimelord, was a target over your head. She cared about Lance the most, and decided to hurt him herself instead of someone with a souped-up uzi and orders to maintain business doing so.  
  
“You sound thrilled about that,” Keith remarked instead. She didn’t. She sounded torn. Like she still couldn’t make up her mind. Then again, in her position, any decision probably felt like the wrong one.  
  
A quiet yelp came from behind the counter when Lance accidentally poured too much tea into a cup, causing it to spill over the edge and onto his hand.  
  
“Careful, it’s hot,” Pidge deadpanned from the register. “That’ll be $12.36, ma’am.”  
  
Allura sighed. Tired. “He’s an idiot. But he’s my idiot. You know, ever since we dated our senior year, he made me feel like… normal. Like I was meant to be here. I could actually relax around him. I felt like a normal teenage girl. Instead of, you know, an heiress to a family fortune acquired by questionable means.”  
  
Keith set his coffee down. “Allura, I think you might be overthinking this a little. Which, I totally get, believe me. But I think ultimately you have to ask yourself only one question: what is it you really want?”  
  
She hadn’t taken her eyes away from that counter by the way. Lance caught her eye as he was stirring a drink, looked surprised for a moment, and then winked at her with a grin.  
  
“Idiot,” she muttered again. Then she replied, just loud enough for Keith to hear, “I want to be with him. Somewhere peaceful. Where no one can bother us.”  
  
“You know you don’t have to go back.”  
  
“I _do.”_  
  
“You _don’t.”_  
  
This was where Keith and Allura clashed. His emotion and her practicality. He followed his heart and she her head and it’s what kept them both surviving through their respective experiences. And it had led to fights between them before. Only a fight wasn’t about to break between them this night. This was ultimately her decision to make, Keith was just here to provide support and play the much-needed Devil’s Advocate.  
  
She didn’t want to leave. Not just Lance. She didn’t want to leave any of them. It was in the way she had broken down at the Christmas party. In the way she would stare at everything like she was silently saying goodbye. In the way she held Keith in a hug worth all the hugs in the six years they had known each other.  
  
“My father’s work was more than just the family business,” she explained. “What he built, what he accomplished, it all went back to the community. He tried to make everything better for our countrymen. Most our business is actually medicinal. The benefits it provides to patients with even less side effects than your average painkiller makes it far more valuable than any price in other markets, if you know what I mean. But by controlling its trade through all avenues, even in the underworld, we could minimize the illicit activity. Keep it from falling into the wrong hands, so to speak. It’s still not the proudest way to handle it. But the damage would be far worse, otherwise. I have to go back to prevent that from happening. But… I don’t know if it’s right for me to take Lance with me.”  
  
“Maybe you should tell him. All of it. The real story. No jokes this time. And he can make the decision himself.”  
  
“Far easier said than done. Even his knowledge could put him in danger.” She considered Keith then, the first time she had actually looked at him since they sat down at the table, and tilted her head. “Could you do it?”  
  
“Do what?”  
  
“If you were involved in something highly, um, frowned upon morally and legally, could you tell Shiro? Especially if what you were doing could be a very real danger to him?”  
  
Keith took a long sip of his mocha, staring back at Allura thoughtfully. He wanted to burst out laughing, and his stomach twisted painfully as he struggled to keep that laughter in. She would think he was making fun of her. He wasn’t, but she wouldn’t understand the joke. His own little private joke.  
  
“I dunno,” he finally answered, his words parting the steam climbing from the cup in front of his face. “Probably not.”

He hadn't so far.

 

 

**10**  
  
Keith had never been so nervous in his whole life.  
  
Shiro hadn’t gone home for Christmas. He didn’t say why other than “too many finals and some extra credit stuff”. Keith warned him that he was going to get Pidge to hack into the system and make him drop a couple of classes next semester. Shiro wasn’t overworking himself as much as he used to now that Keith kept dragging him out of the dorms and away from assignments, but that didn’t mean his old habits had been broken.  
  
Tonight was Christmas Eve. Shiro was going to meet him at the town center where they lit up a giant Christmas tree every year. It was even snowing, as if the evening could not be more magical. The first snow of Christmas.  
  
Keith shrugged his shoulders so his scarf could climb further up his ears. The wind was picking up a little. The weatherman who was a bit of a local celebrity in these parts had been warning them all for two days of the approaching storm like some kind of climate oracle. At the moment, nobody seemed to listen to him or care as they celebrated Christmas Eve in the town center filled with food stands, mini rides, and a kid’s play area while waiting for the tree to be lit. The snow at the moment was regarded as a magical blessing, not the sign of an impending force of nature about to tear through their town.  
  
What was he _doing?_  
  
He had orchestrated so much to lure Shiro to him. He knew that guy’s type. The same type as others he had taken down to his basement, only he was far more rugged and good looking. A party animal once, lived life the fullest and in the moment. And like a captured wild animal, he longed to go back to those days. Keith was everything he wanted to be again, and his way back. The drinking. The dancing. All of that was true about Keith, but with Shiro around, to reel him in, Keith had to amplify that part of himself.  
  
What changed? When Shiro refused him? Keith had to admit that had hurt his pride a lot. He also felt legitimately terrible. At that point, Keith realized he truly cared about Shiro a bit. He really didn’t want to push him too far.  
  
All of Keith’s victims had been willing. All six of them. He had no plans for Shiro to be any different.  
  
Except…  
  
Pictures weren’t enough. Shiro had so many different smiles, and Keith knew that no amount of photos in a lifetime could capture them all. And Keith wanted to see all of them. Was that why he was so anxious right now? These days, he thought less and less about luring Shiro back to his house and face his demise. Now, Keith just wanted to see him.   
_  
Where was he?_  
  
Keith looked down at his phone, brows pinching together with worry. The energy in the air was high, children screeching in play, couples laughing together, the smell of hot cocoa, eggnog, cinnamon and warm and delicious things to eat wafting and mixing in the air with the carols and jingle bells. The snow fell harder. Fifteen minutes until the tree would light up according to the phone’s clock and the announcement on the speaker. But no Shiro.  
  
Keith shifted from one foot to the other. The hot cocoa he had bought a while ago had gone barely lukewarm by now, and his hands were cold again. Everyone was with someone here whether with a date or friends or other family members. Now he was starting to feel a little foolish, standing out here by himself.  
  
Twelve minutes.  
  
Shiro was never late for any of their dates. The military in him. Fifteen minutes early is on time or something ridiculous like that.

 

 

> **Hellcat:** Hey there! Did u fall asleep? ;P

 

Keith hoped his text came off as lighthearted and no big deal and not at all anxious like he was starting to feel.  
  
“Keith! Keith!”  
  
He glanced over to see Pidge jogging up to him, Hunk trailing behind. They were holding hands. As much as Pidge teased about their relationship, she had no issue showing it off. Keith had asked how they hooked up, but Pidge had only shrugged and said that they hung out together so often they might as well be dating and everything had went from there.  
  
“Hey, bud!” Hunk called with a wave of his free hand. “What’s up? Come to see the lights, too?”  
  
“I’m actually more interested in seeing if some kid tries to pull Santa’s beard off his face this year,” Keith replied.  
  
“Oooh, good luck with that, kid. I think Santa’s beard is real this year.”  
  
“Pull the beard, pull the beard!” Pidge cackled.  
  
Except most of the children had abandoned Santa and tiny Christmas play village to scuttle to their parents and guardians. The crowd had moved closer to the tree, most of them staring up at it as their voices dwindled to quiet murmurs.  
  
“You here alone?” Hunk asked. “Where’s Shiro? Oh, man, you guys aren't fighting again, are ya?"   
  
“Running late,” Keith said with a heavy sigh.  
  
“Aw, bummer.”  
  
“You can hang out with us to watch the lighting if you want,” Pidge offered. She shivered and pushed herself closer to Hunk. “Aw, man, it’s so cold. I wish I was in Cuba with Lance and Allura. Must be so nice with all that ocean and warmth and no snow at all.”  
  
Hunk snorted. “Lance actually hates it because of that, he really likes snow. He complains about how building a sandman is not the same as a snowman in every other message he sends me. And an indoor ice-skating rink is not at all the same, either, which, to be fair, he’s not wrong.”  
  
Usually, Lance went home to California every Christmas, where they spent the holiday in his mother's hometown up in the northern regions of the state. Lots of snow up there. But he told everyone that this year was different because one of his great-uncles was about to kick the bucket so a massive family reunion down in Cuba was going to happen instead. His friends had offered their condolences, to which Lance replied that the man was almost a hundred and hardly someone Lance actually knew. Chances were the old man was just being over-dramatic, and Keith finally understood where Lance got it from.  
  
Like he was going to hate being there. Warm beaches and ocean and a bikini-clad Allura under his arm. Oh, yeah, Lance was going to be complaining a-plenty, uh huh.  
  
“He and Allura are doing pretty good so that nightmare is finally over,” Hunk was saying. “I guess they’re going to try the long-distance thing when she moves back to New Zealand and go from there.”  
  
“Although, if she’s meeting all his relatives, then they’re practically married by now,” Pidge pointed out. “So, yeah, anyway, you wanna watch the lighting with us since Shiro’s not here yet?”  
  
Keith glanced down at their clasped hands, Hunk’s beefy palm wrapped gently around her much smaller wrist. They were clearly here on a date. He’d just be the third wheel.  
  
“Shiro’s on his way,” Keith said. “I’m just gonna grab some more cocoa and wait for him there. You two have fun.”  
  
Hunk and Pidge exchanged glances, and then Hunk gave him a small smile. “Okay, dude. We’ll be right over by the BBQ truck if you need us for anything. Oh, and definitely try the bacon-wrapped turkey legs. I helped with the recipe and they are absolutely to die for. Sal really outdid himself with the sauce this year.”  
  
“Sure thing.”  
  
Keith watched them leave, watched those clasped hands swing happily back and forth, and then made his way to the hot cocoa tent. Maybe Shiro will be here by the time he got his refill and they could share. That would be nice. Keith hated sharing any of his food or drink with other people. Too many germs, and it just seemed super gross. But with Shiro, it was fine.  
  
The worker at the cocoa stand looked slightly annoyed that he had to make a drink so close to the tree lighting, but he complied without complaint. Lots of whipped cream. And chocolate sprinkles. Keith liked his hot cocoa like he liked his coffee: hot and sugary.  
  
Two minutes.  
  
Half the town was probably here tonight, and yet Keith felt completely alone. He was tempted to actually go after Pidge and Hunk and take them up on their offer to watch the lighting together just to shake off this heavy feeling of watching the world from behind an invisible box that no one could penetrate. Date or no date, he knew they wouldn’t mind him tagging along for a few minutes just to watch a tree light up. And then they could continue on their date and he wouldn’t have to feel like a third wheel.  
  
Ugh, except even thinking about it made him feel like a third wheel. Just because they wouldn’t mind didn’t mean that they would be happy about it, trying to set up their own mood while he was just standing there next to them, awkwardly. It wouldn’t change that lonely feeling. At all. In fact, talking to them earlier made Keith feel even lonelier.  
  
Damn, when had he become so dependent on Shiro’s company?  
  
“Ten… nine… eight…!”  
  
The crowd had started a countdown like it was New Year’s Eve instead of Christmas Eve, drifting even closer to the tree in collective anticipation. All the food stand workers had stopped what they were doing to watch. Keith hung out in the back like a straggler, his refill of hot cocoa not enough to warm him this time.  
  
“… three… two… one…!”  
  
A huge cheer resonated in the air as the tree lit up in bright gold and white, sparkling and shimmering with the snow falling around it. A choir of bells from the local church rang out “We Wish You a Merry Christmas.” Loud voices soon joined in with the lyrics. Several couples held each other close and exchanged kisses. Christmas had officially come to this little college town of Roan City, and people grasped their loved ones tight to welcome it together.  
  
Only Keith stood apart and alone.  
  
Which wasn’t so bad, really. It was just a tree lighting. Exciting, yes, but not a huge deal. Something must have come up, and therefore Shiro couldn’t even make it. Not even text back that he couldn’t make it according to the lack of new messages and missed calls on Keith’s phone. Life didn’t stop happening just because the town tree was going to be lit for Christmas. And there would always be next year.  
  
The thought made Keith realize that, no, there wasn’t. There wasn’t going to be a next year, not for them. Not unless...  
  
“Keith! K- _Keith!”_  
  
Keith spun around for the most cliché experience he’d ever had in his life. Shiro, fashionably late, running up to him through a swirl of snow, hair messy and jacket not even zipped up, smoke puffing out of his mouth. “Keith!” he gasped again. Then he finally came to a stop in front of him, placing his hands on his knees as he wheezed.  
  
“Shiro, what - ?”  
  
Shiro held up a finger for Keith to wait a moment as he desperately tried to catch his breath.  
  
“Are you okay?”  
  
Shiro gave him a dismissive wave.  
  
“If you say so. You look like you’re about to collapse, dude.”  
  
“I’m… fine…”  
  
“Here.” When Shiro finally straightened up, Keith handed him his cocoa and started zipping up his jacket. “You need to take care of yourself better,” Keith chastised gently.  
  
“Sorry. I’m so sorry. I had actually hoped to get here before you.”  
  
“Yeah, you jerk, what the hell happened?” Keith demanded, but there was no edge to his tone. “I tried texting you but you never replied.”  
  
“I took a nap but I forgot to plug my phone in,” Shiro explained, looking absolutely defeated with his puppy gaze. “So my phone died before my alarm could go off. I kinda woke up in time, but I missed the bus to come down here. And then I didn’t have my phone so I could call an Uber so I just kinda… ran down here.”  
  
Keith gawked. “You ran all the way down here!? That’s like almost five miles!”  
  
“Yeah, I’m apparently not…” Shiro gasped again, still winded. “…I’m not as young as I used to be. Aw, man, I could run an eleven-minute mile and a half in the Air Force. Shit, I let myself go."   
  
“Why didn’t you just plug your phone in somewhere like a McDonald’s or whatever and call an Uber that way?”  
  
Shiro opened his mouth to reply and then closed it. “I… I was too busy running?”  
  
Keith playfully punched his arm. “Jerk. I waited so long for you. You missed the lighting.”  
  
“I’m so sorry,” Shiro repeated, voice so soft and hoarse from exertion. “I really, really am. And I really want to make it up to you.”  
  
“Hmm…” Keith pouted up at him. “I dunno, babe. That’s a lot of making up to do.” He was mostly teasing, of course, because it was always fun to watch Shiro squirm a bit.  
  
Shiro didn’t squirm, not this time. He stepped closer to Keith, gray eyes as dark as clouds during a snowstorm. Even the snow seemed to fall harder. And Keith was almost painfully aware of how big Shiro was compared to him.  
  
“I stayed because I want to spend Christmas with someone special. Privately. All to myself. I want to spend that Christmas with you,” Shiro said quietly, pulling Keith into his arms. Keith didn’t want to give into him so easily, but he was so warm and the snow kept falling and Shiro had never looked so serious before. They leaned in but Shiro didn’t kiss him just yet, and instead whispered into his lips, tracing his finger up Keith’s hip. “And the lighting of the tree means Christmas has officially begun, hasn’t it?”  
  
It was delightfully ironic that Keith was supposed to be the one to seduce Shiro back to his place, and instead things ended up like this instead. Keith sighed as Shiro slotted their mouths together, his tongue sliding gently against the other’s.  
_  
Finally._

 

 

 

**11**  
  
Keith’s house was really cute, Shiro thought.  
  
While it was fully furnished, Keith didn’t have a lot of stuff, so there was still plenty of room in the otherwise small space. It was clean, too, with everything in its own place and none of the clutter you’d expect in the living area of an 18-year-old college student. In fact, Shiro’s own dorm was pretty messy with stacks of textbooks and towers of paper and old empty ramen cups lying around. Which was why he’d thought it would be better if they went to Keith’s place to, um, spend Christmas together. His dorm wasn’t exactly romantic. And he was convinced there was a family of cockroaches living behind his bookcase.  
  
He really needed to get his shit together.  
  
Like an older woman wearing a fair amount of makeup, the house was showing its age through the pretty presentation. Wallpaper with very faded flowered was peeling in some places. Tiny patches of water damage could be spotted on the ceiling. The floor creaked and groaned in protest beneath the weight of his feet.  
  
On his way in, Shiro had noticed a few pictures hanging up in the hallway that led to the living room. He didn’t recognize any of the people in them. One photo was an old, yellowing portrait of a beautiful Korean woman wearing a traditional hanbok, her black hair pulled back and decorated with red flowers. Possibly a grandmother or even great-grandmother of Keith’s.  
  
“Is this your family?” Shiro called.  
  
Keith poked his head from around the kitchen and shrugged. “I… guess? Everything in here has been here since before I moved in, and I just didn’t bother with any of it. My old man says he bought this house when he and my mom were engaged, before I was born.”  
  
“And he kept it all this time?”  
  
Keith shrugged again, and disappeared back into the kitchen. “It’s whatever. It’s my place now.”  
  
Shiro snooped around a bit more while Keith busied himself in the kitchen making them some snacks. He paused again in front of a plain brown door.  
  
A brown closet door inside of a ranch style house wasn’t all that remarkable or unusual, but something about it made Shiro give pause. He was tall enough for his head to touch the top frame, yet the door loomed menacingly in front of him. Like it was daring him to open it and walk inside.  
  
It gave him a feeling, an old feeling, a familiar feeling. Something from what felt like an entirely other lifetime. The same feeling that lingered in the moments just after waking from another nightmare. It even smelled like from so long ago. Rotten. Wrong.  
  
“That would be the basement.”  
  
Shiro jumped when Keith suddenly spoke up from right behind him. He hadn’t even heard him walk up. A knife gleamed in Keith’s hand, and red dripped from the blade in fat drops that hit the floor with a wet smack.  
  
“What’s down there?” Shiro couldn’t help asking.  
  
“It’s a basement, so, junk mostly. Stuff my parents hadn’t bothered taking with them. I only ever go down there when the water heater’s acting up. Gotta give it a good kick if you don’t want a cold shower that day. This house is nice, but it’s older than dirt and overdue for a lot of upgrades.”  
  
“Sounds like you were handed a fixer-upper.”  
  
“Yeah. But, hey, it’s all bought and paid for so can’t complain.”  
  
“Maybe I can help you fix things up? Starting with that basement.”  
  
The lights flickered a bit in the hall. The snow outside had been kicking up to become a legitimate storm the past few hours. The old wiring wouldn’t stand a chance. The idea of curling up with Keith in a power outage with candles flickering around them seemed rather romantic but… it wasn’t enough to keep the chill out of his spine. The shadows over Keith’s face made his eyes black yet still shining brightly, like a large predator staring down its prey from the darkness it hid within.  
  
Keith grinned and held up his knife.  
  
Splat, splat, splat went the red drops from the blade to the floor.  
  
“Hungry? I chopped up some tomatoes. Grew them myself. I think you’ll like them a lot.”

"You chopped up Tomato?" Shiro joked, if anything to get rid of this uneasy feeling in his spine.

"I just said - wait, what? Tomato my cat? What, no - shut up and get in here, nerd." 

Shiro laughed as he joined Keith in the kitchen, making BLT sandwiches, a simple little snack, and he forgot all about that basement door. 

Keith was right, these tomatoes were amazing. Delicious. Absolutely delicious.

 

 

 

**12**  
  
Just as Shiro had predicted, the power flicked out. The wind had really started assaulting the town now, demanding to be let in as it rattled against windows and doors. Keith’s house might be old, but it had been built solid and stood firm in the face of the snowstorm as it had through many snowstorms before. Shiro couldn’t help feeling a little disappointed. They had been watching _A Muppet Christmas Carol_ , his favorite he never failed to watch every year. He had been singing along to all the songs as Keith laughed at him.  
  
But just as Scrooge was about to go visit Kermit Crachett the Frog at his humble London slum at the behest of Christmas Present, the TV flicked to black. “Aw, the best song is about to come on!” Shiro complained into the darkness that had cannonballed over the house.  
  
“You mean the saddest song,” Keith corrected. “It’s sung by Tiny Tim and you know what happens to him.”  
  
“No, I don’t!” Shiro covered his ears with his hands. “La la la, not listening, bless us all~”  
  
Keith leaned in close, body brushing against Shiro’s arm, and whispered, “Spoilers: Tiny Tim dies in the future and that guilt makes Scrooge a better person.”  
  
“How dare you, you monster!” Shiro yelped back with a mock gasp as Keith cackled with wicked glee.  
  
With Keith this close to him, Shiro realized how damn good he smelled. It was a gentle smell like apples and old leather, something you wouldn’t really notice unless you were allowed to get very, very close to him. A kind of subtle smell meant for Shiro alone.  
  
He was kissing Keith before he realized it. With his hair snaked through the curls at Keith’s nape, it was a rougher kiss than he normally gave, his teeth scraping over that plush bottom lip and tongue demanding to be let in.  
  
“I should… find some candles…” Keith moaned breathlessly and didn't make any move to get off the couch.  
  
“Don’t move,” Shiro replied in a harsh, hoarse tone. He fell back on the couch to pull Keith on top of him. There was something in this darkness around them, and it had woken Shiro right up. He rubbed his hips against Keith’s groin, delighting in the bulge he felt there. This was a bit of payback from the club. Now Keith was the one squirming from temptation as Shiro licked into his mouth and sucked on his lips and his hands traveled down the curve of Keith’s spine to squeeze his ass. This time, Shiro had no plans stopping there, and judging by Keith’s soft mewling, the other had no plans to stop him.  
  
Outside, the front screen door banged wildly in the snowy wind.  
  
"Wait," Shiro suddenly said. Only because it had to be said. 

Keith growled impatiently. "I swear to God, Shiro, if you're just teasing me again - " 

"No, no. But, um, are we... prepared? At all?" 

Keith stared down at him with the most mischievous, impish, evil grin that Shiro could see clearly, one eyebrow raised. "Oh? You wanna go that far, do you? I thought we were just gonna rub off each other a bit, but if it's butt stuff you're going for..." 

He trailed off, and Shiro flushed bright enough to be obvious in the darkness, despite his full erection pressing tight against Keith's own hardened crotch. 

"I was just gonna say," Shiro pointed out, voice cracking only so slightly, "that it's been a while." 

"Since you fucked someone?" 

"...since I let someone fuck me." 

Keith was silent for a long, long moment. Then, "Figures you'd be a bottom." 

Shiro choked. "Not _always!"_ he shot back, and his voice cracked clearly this time. 

"Well, in that case, why don't I ride you?" 

_Shiro.exe has stopped working._ "A-a-are you...?" 

Keith leaned forward, and Shiro shivered as their hips slid over each other, a flash of ecstasy shooting up his spine. "Trust me, I am plenty prepared," Keith whispered hoarsely in Shiro's ear, and Shiro was certain he blacked out for half a second there. "You can only imagine the things I've done to myself thinking of you." 

Oh, but Shiro definitely got an idea several minutes later when Keith eventually lubed himself up and straddled his hips. He lowered his body, and the slightest resistance was a testament to how much Keith thought of Shiro like this. Shiro couldn't hold back a lewd moan as he sank deep in that wet heat. 

_"Shiro!"_ Keith gasped, head thrown back, spine curled. "Oh, God, you - goddammit, Shiro, _fuck_... ah, you're bigger than I thought you'd be." 

Shiro pushed past the growing haze of his pleasure to ask, "I'm not hurting you, am I?" 

"Huh?" Keith smiled. "Fuck no, you feel amazing." 

As if to prove it, Keith rose up only to fall back down on Shiro again. Shiro cried out. And Keith did it again. And again. Up. Down. Faster. Faster, Keith, please! Until Keith was bouncing wildly on Shiro's lap, until Shiro pumped his cock in time with their erratic, greedy thrusts. Until they both saw stars. Until they collapsed against each other in a sticky mess, planting lazy, blissed-out kisses on each other's mouths. 

Until the storm faded away to warm afterglow. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter art by Grey [tumblr](https://escaleamare.tumblr.com/post/165422139286/here-is-my-piece-for-bluerobokitty-s-fic-silver) | [twitter](https://twitter.com/ISLEDGREY/status/909245042526625792)


	4. Part 4

**1**  
  
It's funny how everything always seemed to start with this particular Denny’s just a short walk away from campus. It was here that Shiro had decided he was very, very attracted to Keith and wanted more with him, initializing the snail’s pace romance between them.  
  
It was here that Keith decided that Shiro was going to be his next victim.  
  
Until he actually fell for his would-be victim. Oops.  
  
The group was hanging out at Denny’s for lunch this afternoon. Lance and Allura sat together in one booth, and she giggled while trying to keep him from taking her hashbrowns. Keith watched in amusement because Lance was two ticks from learning very quickly that this wasn’t just gross flirting and Allura was very overprotective of her food. You would think someone who had been with her for well over three years would've figured that out by now, but Lance never really ever learned his lesson, either.  
  
Keith wondered if Allura really was okay with getting back with Lance despite leaving him in a few months. But ever since Christmas, she’d kept her lid closed even tighter when it came to the subject of her home and family. He kinda hoped she would talk to Keith, at least, before she left. Keith wasn’t happy about his best friend leaving, either. He’d always assumed her and this little ragtag group of theirs would always be together for their college years.  
  
Keith didn’t take to change very well. He was very tired of it, the constant moving, the constant leaving, and mostly leaving without ever saying good-bye.  
  
“You okay?” Shiro asked. He had been rambling nervously about one of his exams coming up, which Keith, being the terrible boyfriend he was, had only been barely paying attention to before his thoughts wandered off.  
  
“I’m fine,” Keith assured him with a nod. “Sorry.”  
  
“I’m boring you, aren’t I?”  
  
“You are a nerd.”  
  
Shiro flicked some mac-and-cheese noodles at him. “How dare you.” Said the grown-ass man who ordered mac-and-cheese from the kid's menu.  
  
Keith was about to teach this nerd why it was not wise to pick a food fight with him, when their waiter came by. “Can I get you some more coffee, sir?”  
  
It was that very same waiter who served them the night Shiro and Keith met, Keith recalled. Jake the Waiter with his freckles and blond tipped dark hair like it was the early 2000s. And clearly he only had eyes for Shiro as he didn’t even look twice at Keith, whose mug was actually empty.  
  
“I’m good,” Shiro replied pleasantly, adorably oblivious to the Fuck-Me-Daddy eyes Jake was giving him. Keith’s gut twisted, and it had nothing to do with the Grand Slam Slugger he'd just destroyed.  
  
“How ‘bout you, Keith?”  
  
Jake the Waiter side-eyed Keith in a cool, distant glare that would have him fired on the spot if his manager saw. “I’ll definitely take some more, thanks for asking,” Keith clipped.  
  
Jake dutifully poured him coffee. Keith resisted the urge to push the mug to the floor and make him pick up the shattered pieces with his teeth.  
  
It was kinda startling, actually, where this viciousness came from. Shiro was an extremely good-looking guy, and this Jake bro wasn’t the first to make a pass at him while they were out together. Hell, Lance flirted with Shiro all the time, mostly just to piss Keith off, but still.  
  
Shiro tilted his head in concern. “Are you sure you’re okay? We can leave if you want.”  
  
“Yeah. Let’s get the fuck outta here.”  
  
Something deep inside Keith began to itch, and the sooner he was away from this atmosphere, the better.

 

 

 

**2**  
  
Valentine’s Day was coming which meant two things: 1) spring was around the corner and 2) Keith actually had a significant other to do something special with this year.  
  
And, dare he believe it, Keith was actually looking forward to this holiday. But mostly he was looking forward doing something very special for Shiro. Even better, with Shiro’s birthday only two weeks away, he could combine the two in one big romantic date. Shiro was going to be twenty-five, and Keith remembered because not a day went by that Shiro didn’t lament about how old he was getting.  
  
“You’re not old,” Keith had told him while they were brushing their teeth one morning.  
  
“My joints made this creaking sound when I got out of bed this morning,” Shiro had whined back, voice muffled with the toothbrush poking out of the bubbling minty paste in his mouth.  
  
Shiro didn’t live here, not really. But he spent the night often enough to leave his toothbrush next to Keith’s in the porcelain purple toothbrush holder by the sink. Wasn’t there something about leaving a toothbrush when it comes to relationships? Something about once a toothbrush moves in, the owner follows soon after? Keith didn’t think he would mind that. Shiro probably wouldn’t, either, but he was very close in finishing up most of his credits for his degree. After one or two summer classes, and he would be free. And if they were still together then, well, who knows.  
  
All Keith knew for certain was that he was actually happy.  
  
Not that he’d never been happy before, rare and far between those moments had been. He’d been mostly content with his lot in life, and being with his friends did make him happy in a way. But this was… a different kind of happiness. One that bubbled in his stomach and spread warmth to each end of his nerves. One that held him tight and both embarrassed and excited him. One that made his face hot and his breath quicken and his mind wonder the next would bring for them.  
  
It was a happiness that didn’t bore him. He hadn’t been bored in so long.  
  
The basement remained empty and the citizens of Roan City slept peacefully those nights thinking the horror that plagued their county since last summer had finally left them.  
  
It hadn’t. It was just dating.

 

 

 

**3**  
  
Shiro arched an eyebrow when Keith pulled into campus in Hunk’s Old Yeller. He opened the passenger door to a grinning Keith. “What’s this?” Shiro asked with a surprised grin of his own, and his face tingled in the warm air blasting from the car. “No motorcycle tonight?”  
  
“In this weather?” Keith snorted. “Get in.”  
  
“Are we going shopping?” Shiro joked, sitting down and shutting the door, which made the frame creak a bit in protest.  
  
“It’s like almost eleven, dude, everything’s closed.”  
  
“It’s a joke. Y’know that one where – “  
  
Shiro continued talking even as Keith shoved his hand in his face. “Shush, old coot. Just sit back and enjoy the ride.”  
  
“Now that’s intriguing. Where are we going?”  
  
Keith gave him a dry, oh-please expression. “Your Valentine’s Day-slash-birthday present.”  
  
Even more intriguing. Shiro had been a little disappointed that they didn’t do much for Valentine’s Day besides a nice dinner and some soft nookie, which was a typical Saturday night for them at this point, but Keith had promised several times that his combined Valentine’s/birthday present was going to something extra special. “You’re gonna love it.” Keith had been mincing some tomatoes (not the cat), and Shiro still wasn’t sure why he remembered that particular detail except that the knife gleaming in Keith’s hand was next to beautiful.  
  
_“But I didn’t really get you anything, and I feel bad, even though you said – “_  
  
His lips trembled a bit at the memory of the flat part of that cold blade barely touching his mouth with goopy tomato juice dripping down a very sharp edge.  
  
_“I know what I said. This is something for both of us. I just want you with me.”_  
  
And now here they were, the interior of the car growing darker as Keith drove farther out of the city, into the quiet suburbs, and then farther still. They didn’t say much that whole time. Keith was a quiet person, which Shiro appreciated, and the two of them could spend long hours just enjoying each other’s silent company. It made spending time with him while simultaneously working on meeting assignment deadlines easier whenever Keith came to visit his dorm (until one day when Shiro was concentrating particularly hard, Keith had gotten bored, crawled under the desk, nudged his head between Shiro’s knees to unzip that fly with his teeth, and, well, Shiro welcomed the break).  
  
Shiro wasn’t entirely sure he was up for doing things in Hunk’s car, however. Like, whenever there was a group outing, they all pretty much clown-car’d in here. The old, clunky sedan made back in the day when having large size family cars was ideal could sit five people comfortably with Pidge squeezing in somewhere. Usually on Allura’s lap, smirking at Lance.  Using the backseat for that, possibly making a mess and desperately trying to clean after, people sitting there afterward without a clue…  
  
“You okay?” Keith asked, giving Shiro the quickest glance before turning his eyes back on the road, illuminated only by the car’s bright headlights, curving before them.  
  
“I’m fine,” Shiro replied, although his voice cracked ever so slightly because his brain was still fixated on the idea of doing something naughty with Keith in a place they shouldn’t.  
  
Keith’s lips curled in a mischievous smirk. “Don’t be nervous. We’re almost there.”  
  
“Heh. Who’s nervous?”  
  
Then Keith pulled over onto the shoulder on that desolate highway where nothing but trees surrounded them. He didn’t say anything as he placed the gear in Park and took off his seatbelt. Shiro watched as he leaned toward the backseat, reaching for something. He heard the clinking of metal and it reminded him of sharp blades clinking together. It was really, really dark out here with no street lamps to be seen, and the headlights only amplified that darkness encroaching on them like a lurking, hungry beast.  
  
Then Keith leaned into Shiro and kissed him with that same hunger, as if the beast had managed to climb inside the car. Shiro sighed as he gave into Keith, opening his mouth to let his greedy little tongue take whatever he wanted. He no longer had any concerns about possibly defiling Hunk’s car.  
  
“I’m going to blindfold you,” Keith whispered when they parted for much-needed air.  
  
Well, if that didn’t make Shiro twitch. “Kinky.”  
  
Keith frowned, giving him this exasperated look he usually reserved for Lance’s antics. “It’s a surprise, dumdum, get your mind outta the gutter.”  
  
Said his handsy boyfriend who had just been all over him like white on rice a second ago.  
  
Grinning, Shiro happily let Keith tie the blindfold around his eyes. Given his circumstances, he thought he wouldn’t be into this sort of thing anymore. But he liked it, actually. Still did. Encased in darkness, heart pounding in hungry anticipation, waiting, lurking…  
  
He wondered if maybe they should move to the backseat, but then he heard the click of a seatbelt fastening back in place and the shift of gears. Then the car moved, forward, the smooth asphalt turning into the hard crunch of gravel. The ride was slower now, bouncier, but no less curvy, swaying Shiro’s body every which way. Almost sickening. Shiro could see it clearly in his mind. An old dirt road barely used anymore going deep into the woods, far away from the highway, far from any civilization. He could hear wild branches long overdue for a trim scraping against metal and smacking the windows. Up, up, up, they went, up the face of some mountain, as if Keith was taking them to the edge of the world where it would just be the two of them.  
  
“Are you taking me somewhere to murder me?” Shiro joked.  
  
“Hmm.”  
  
Keith always did have an interesting sense of humor.  
  
Even the radio fizzed out as they were too high up and too remote to receive a good signal. The car became silent with nothing but the sound of tire rolling against rock. Old Yeller creaked and groaned with each mile Keith pushed it forward. The old boy had good bones, but he wasn’t made for off-roading.  
  
Then the grinding came to a halt as the road, no less bumpy, was no longer made of gravel. The car steadily slowed to a stop, there was the shift of a gear and the clank of the emergency brake being pulled back into place, and the engine shuddered off. The clicking of a seatbelt and the opening of the driver’s side door. Shiro licked the sweat off his upper lip, wondering what kind of surprise Keith had in store for him that required him to be blindfolded and taken out miles into the wild. Keith opened the back passenger door and rummaged around with whatever he had back there, and the sound of blades clinking together reached Shiro’s ears once more.  
  
“Keith?”  
  
Keith didn’t reply but continued to hum a tune beneath his breath as he busied himself with whatever it was he was doing as he moved to and from the car several times. Shiro recognized the song as the same one they had heard in the club on their first major date, the one that tempted him beyond reason to take Keith places he hadn’t been prepared to go just yet at the time.  
  
His heart slammed around in his chest like a trapped animal.  
  
Faster and faster…  
  
His door opened, and Keith’s body brushed along his as the other leaned over to unbuckle him. Keith helped Shiro out of the car. “Can I take off the blindfold now?” Shiro asked.  
  
“Nope.”  
  
It was cold out here. Colder than down in the valley, and the air was thinner. Keith gently pushed him somewhere, away from the car, and Shiro’s feet crunched against the grass already covered with frost.  
  
“Now?”  
  
“Don’t be so impatient.”  
  
Shiro whined, and Keith playfully poked him.  
  
Finally, Keith had him stop.  
  
Then Shiro shivered as icy cold steel, colder than the frosty late winter air surrounding them, pressed flatly against his skull. It wiggled under the blindfold and then ripped it off with a deafening snap of fabric.  
  
“Now you can look.”  
  
Shiro stood there… stunned. That’s the only way he could describe it.  
  
They stood in a clearing high on a hilltop in the middle of the forest. A quilt spread just at his feet, illuminated by two oil lanterns sitting alongside a basket and a bottle of wine. And a small telescope. And above them, high above and yet seemingly close enough that he could just reach out and hold them in his hands, arched clusters upon clusters of shimmering stars. Shiro stared and stared, even able to make out the faint trail of the Milky Way itself.  
  
“I… um, I’ve been wanting to take you out here since Christmas,” Keith said softly from next to him. His voice sounded so soft, so shy, the overconfidence he usually displayed no longer there. “It’s, um, a special place of mine. I don’t like other people knowing about it. Uh, but, when you talked about your love of space and that’s why you decided to go into astrophysics. And that… you really wanted to go into NASA and be an astronaut and you were using the military for that, but then things happened and your… arm…”  
  
Shiro tore his eyes away from the night sky that had him so captivated since childhood to stare at Keith. Even in darkness, Shiro could tell Keith was blushing hard all the way to his ears as the younger man nervously played with a small dagger in his fingers.  
  
Keith remembered all of that?  
  
Shiro never talked about those things. Unless he was drunk. Very, very drunk. Which was another thing that didn’t happen often anymore. But he had been very, very drunk around Keith a few times, and apparently each time he had been shooting off at that mouth about stuff that didn’t really matter anymore. And Keith remembered all of that.  
  
Just standing out here was like he was a child again, a child with big dreams of going into space.  
  
“S-so… so I thought, y’know, we could, like, stargaze together…” Keith trailed off, making a whimpering sound in his throat as if this incredible gesture was more than he could bear. “I’m sorry, this is so damn cheesy, I’m being insensitive, I shouldn’t have – this was a bad idea, I really fucked up now, I’m so sorr – “  
  
Shiro cut him off as he grabbed Keith’s shoulders and pressed their mouths together. He kissed Keith deep, and when he gently pulled away, Keith’s eyes were still closed.  
  
“You did this? For me?”  
  
Keith opened his eyes, still a little dazed from the sudden kiss, and nodded.  
  
Shiro took a step back, the robotic prosthetic whirring gently as he covered his mouth with his hand. His vision blurred.  
  
Shiro would be the first to admit that he was a rather emotional kinda guy. Dog movies made him sob like a baby, for starters. Being in the military had done many things to him, but take away his sentimentality was not one of them.  
  
“Are you crying!?” Keith squeaked.  
  
“N-not trying to,” Shiro sniffed because now that it was pointed out, of course the tears started coming.  
  
“Don’t cry!” Keith shrieked, panicked.  
  
Shiro laughed, wiping at the tears that kept coming with the underside of his palm. “This is just… the nicest – “ No, that was a terrible word. “ – the most amazing thing anyone has ever done for me. Not even in my past relationships.” He sniffed, smiling at Keith who still looked ready to run back into the car and peel out of there. “And dinner with wine under the stars? I didn’t realize you were such a romantic.”  
  
“That wasn’t my idea!” Keith immediately protested. “I was just gonna do some stargazing with you, s’all. But when I told Hunk what I needed his car for, he insisted on making us something to eat. It’s not much, since it’s so last minute. Just some turkey sandwiches and soup.”  
  
“If Hunk’s making it, it’s not just sandwiches and soup,” Shiro pointed out as they sat down on the quilt and Keith handed him a plate. “And even if we were just stargazing, it’s still very romantic.”  
  
Keith glanced shyly away. “Shut up, nerd.”  
  
That late February night was frigid, but the air between them was as warm as summer.

 

 

 

**4**  
  
Their little romantic night out seemed to make things worse instead of better.  
  
Another incident like at Denny’s occurred at the movie theater the next evening when the latest superhero blockbuster hit the screens and they just had to see it together. Shiro had welcomed the break, now that he realized taking time to recharge actually improved his concentration. Keith had gone to the bathroom so he wouldn’t get a full bladder at the film’s climax like usual, and when he came back, Shiro was deep in conversation with a girl in pigtails sitting in the row in front of theirs. She laughed brightly at something he said, and he grinned like an idiot completely proud of himself.  
  
“What’s up?” Keith asked as he sat down next to Shiro, maintaining a casual tone while he scooted a little closer than necessary to his boyfriend.  
  
“Hey, baby,” Shiro greeted. “Just chatting with a classmate from high school. Alexia, this is Keith, my boyfriend.”  
  
“Hi,” Alexia said, but barely more than a courtesy greeting just to be polite. Then she turned all of her attention back to Shiro. They continued to chitchat a bit about things they had been doing since graduation, and she never gave Keith a second glance much less invite him into the conversation. They were just about to get into Shiro’s military days, when Keith grabbed his hand.  
  
“Let’s go, Shiro.”  
  
“Huh?”  
  
“I wanna make out with you in the dark corner before the movie starts.”  
  
“Um… okay…?”  
  
Alexia gave Keith a dirty look that he matched before dragging Shiro up the stairs to the back row. Where he promptly shoved Shiro into the wall and all but crawled into his chair to kiss him a bit more forcefully than usual, a reminder of just who Shiro was out on a date with here.

 

 

 

**5**  
  
Then there was the girl at the grocery store who just needed Shiro’s help reaching an item on the top shelf, and Keith absolutely did not miss her eyes appreciating the curve of his spine as he stretched up. And another girl at that same grocery store who slipped on the wet floor, falling conveniently into Shiro's bulky arms.  
  
One of the newer employees at the Black Lion Café wouldn’t take his eyes off Shiro as he rung up his order and took it upon himself to make the coffee for him instead of ringing up more customers.  
  
And at the gym, they ran into another one of Shiro’s old classmates. More accurately, the guy practically ran over Keith as he volunteered to spot Shiro’s bench presses despite Keith standing right fucking there.  
  
Even the old librarian ladies blushed with sappy grins as they checked out Shiro’s books (...and his pecs), happily offering any services he would be willing to take advantage of. Okay, that was kinda cute, actually, but still. It was the principle of the matter.  
  
Keith and Shiro were at that stage in their relationship now where they no longer were so hyper-focused on each other. The honeymoon phase was wearing away as their relationship deepened, and now the rest of the world was coming into context. And Keith realized just how attractive Shiro was. Objectively. To everyone. Shiro was very self-conscious about his looks, the white bangs and the scar making him stand out more than he’d like, and he often told Keith so. Keith would always counter that Shiro was just fine and handsome the way he was, and now he noticed that his words had been a drastic understatement. If anything, those features made him even more attractive because they were intriguing. And a thirst for intrigue was a vital part of the human condition. That’s why tabloids exist.

 

 

 

**6**  
  
Shiro and Hunk were in the student lounge pouring over some astronomy notes when Lance slammed his books on the table. “Lance, you made me mess up!” Hunk complained, pouting at the stray blotch of ink over his paper.  
  
“Sorry, buddy. Ugh, free at last,” Lance groaned as he slumped into a chair. “For the day, at least. Where’s Keith?”  
  
“He has labs,” Shiro answered, “so he’s staying late.”  
  
“Gross. I don’t miss chemistry whatsoever.” Lance sighed and then leaned forward. “So, I’ve made up my mind.”  
  
“About what?” Hunk asked casually, rewriting his notes on a fresh sheet of paper free of stray ink blotches.  
  
“I’m going with Allura to New Zealand.”  
  
Shiro stared. Hunk stopped writing.  
  
“Is that… a good idea?” Shiro asked carefully. “That’s a really big decision, Lance.”  
  
“Yeah, you can’t just up and leave to another country like that,” Hunk added. “You gotta apply for a visa, have enough money, what are you even gonna do for a job? What about school?”  
  
Lance literally waved his concerns away with a dismissive hand. “I’ve already taken care of the visa application. As for school, I’ve got the paperwork to set up a transfer at this really good place with a great aquatic veterinarian program, and I’ll have boarding, food, and they were pretty impressed with my grades – “  
  
The pen dropped out of Hunk’s hand. “What? Already, wha – junk like that takes weeks, months, to process, when exactly did you decide all this? _And when did you change your major?_ I thought you were doing theater - wh-what the quiznak, bro? You didn't tell me _any_ of this!”  
  
Lance squirmed, having the decency to look uncomfortable. “Just after Christmas. When Allura and I got back together.” He jumped to his feet, and the increasing volume of his voice began drawing the attention of other people sitting in the lounge. “I can’t do the long-distance thing, guys! I just can’t! It’s not enough for me. Love Languages are an actual thing, and mine is Physical Touch, I need to be with her, next to her. Allura’s leaving to the other side of the world, do you know how different our time zones will be? I’ll never be able to talk to her again! I don’t want to lose her again, but keeping her with me will be unfair to her when we can’t hold each other or anything. So this is the best thing that’ll keep us together. I’m going with her.”  
  
Hunk gawked, then glanced helplessly at Shiro. He looked torn between shock and wanting to reach across the table to smack his best friend since grade school with a good bash of common sense.  
  
“Is this what Allura wants, too?” Shiro asked carefully. His friends might be younger than him, but they were still grown ass adults capable of making their own decisions. It wasn’t really his place to tell them what they should or shouldn’t do.  
  
Lance looked away. “I haven’t told her yet. It was gonna be a surprise.”  
  
Hunk snorted and it wasn’t a nice sound, at all. “Yeah, you’re gonna pack up and move to the other side of the world to surprise your mafia girlfriend.”  
  
“She’s not part of the mafia!” Lance squawked back. “She was just joking about that. Her family just runs a business is all.”  
  
“She came to America under mysterious circumstances to enroll in this rink-a-dink university despite her having the genius to powerhouse through an Ivy League school and her family being absolutely loaded with both cash and Uzis, c’mon, Lance, you’re a goddamn idiot but not this bad.”  
  
“Guys, we need to take this elsewhere,” Shiro interjected because now the curious expressions of onlookers were darkening to glares at the disturbance.  
  
They ignored him. “What happens if something dangerous happens? She’s part of the damn mafia, what if you get killed?”  
  
“I don’t care about that. I love her. I’d die for her. And if she’s in any kind of danger, if it came down to it, I’d kill for her, too.”  
  
The sheer certainty behind Lance’s bold statement momentarily stunned the other two.  
  
“Shiro, you can’t let him do this,” Hunk pleaded once he recovered. “Tell this over-dramatic lovesick moron that this isn’t some theatre drama, it’s just _stupidity.”_  
  
“It’s _love,_ Shiro,” Lance shot back. “What if _Keith_ was leaving you? Wouldn’t you do the same thing?”  
  
Great. And now he was in the middle. Welp, time to put on the older-brother/mentor pants whether he wanted to or not.  
  
“I think it’s a very rash decision,” Shiro said, “but I stand by what I said earlier. You need to talk to Allura about this. If she doesn’t want you there, it can really hurt your relationship. This is the kind of decision you two need to make together.”  
  
Both Hunk and Lance glowered at Shiro, neither one getting the answer he wanted. Whatever. It wasn’t like Shiro didn’t care, and he absolutely understood where they both were coming from. But, again, not his place or his responsibility.  
  
“Well, it’s mostly a done deal, anyway,” Lance growled stubbornly, collecting his things. “I gotta go. I promised Pidge I’d cover part of her shift today. Later.”  
  
“Idiot,” Hunk growled at Lance’s retreating back. “Sorry, Shiro, I gotta go, too. We can study later.”  
  
“Okay.”  
  
Keith blinked in surprise as he stepped into the lounge just as Hunk brushed past him without a word. “The hell’s going on?” Keith asked when he approached Shiro’s side.  
  
Shiro sighed with heavy exasperation, sinking in his chair. “Lance and Hunk are fighting.”  
  
Keith's eyebrows disappeared beneath his bangs in surprise. “Really?”  
  
“Apparently, Lance decided he’s going to run after Allura to New Zealand.”  
  
“What an idiot.”  
  
Shiro grinned. “Oh? You don’t think that’s kind of romantic? What if I were to leave to the other side of the world, like go back to Japan or something? You wouldn’t follow me?”  
  
“I didn’t say I wouldn’t,” Keith shot back. “But that would still make me an idiot.”  
  
“Touché.”  
  
He slipped Keith’s hand in his, brushing his fingers over callous and the leather of his fingerless gloves he liked to wear.  
  
“You’re not thinking of running off to Japan, are you?” Keith asked.  
  
“No way. We left when I was two, so I don’t even remember it.”  
  
“Good. Because I would have to sneak into the country to drag your ass back to me, and that sounds like a pain.”  
  
Shiro laughed, but Keith’s tone felt like a direct reflection of Lance’s when he spoke about Allura: _…if it came down to it, I’d kill for her, too._

 

 

 

**7**  
  
Roan City and the surrounding region experienced maybe two hot months of summer every year if it was lucky and climate change was on their side. And maybe half of those months didn’t rain and people got to see what the sun actually looked like. So to keep the citizens from regretting where they lived, the city had a giant indoor water park built, open every day of the year except major holidays. The spa rooms were particularly inviting during the freezing winters, and ironically enough, that’s when the park saw the most business. People were especially happy to pretend winter wasn’t here for at least a few hours in the otherwise gray, dull, cold day.  
  
Keith actually enjoyed going out on these occasional double dates with Lance and Allura, because that meant he got to spend some more time with Allura before she left. What he wasn’t happy with was the idea of his ripped boyfriend being ogled by everyone in town. Which was a stupid feeling to have, by the way, but there it was nonetheless.  
  
Even Lance blushed a little when Shiro peeled his shirt off as they changed in the locker room, having never seen Shiro’s practically naked before. Those blue eyes wouldn’t stop roaming the curves and planes of hard muscle and round chest, and had Lance been any less of a friend, Keith would’ve decked him then and there. To his credit, Lance tried to keep his gaze glued to the floor when Shiro stripped off his boxers, although the bright red tips of his ears still gave him away.  
  
It didn’t escape neither Keith’s nor Shiro’s notice that Hunk and Pidge had not accompanied them this time around. Usually, Keith and Shiro would have double dates with either couple separately, but a day at the water park sounded more like another one of their gang’s get-togethers instead of a double date. Which meant that Lance and Hunk were still quarreling. Meaning Lance was still going through his plan to leave. Then again, if his visa and his transfer paperwork were already underway, then there probably wasn’t much he could do to change it. Poor Hunk. He and Lance had been together since the second grade, no wonder he wasn’t taking it very well.  
  
_Click!_  
  
“The hell was that?” Lance demanded.  
  
The sound of a phone camera snapping came from nearby. Like close to Shiro nearby.  
  
“Dude, did someone just take a pic of us!?”  
  
Keith rounded the row of lockers looking for the offender because someone had definitely took a picture just now, and odds were Shiro was their intended subject. But there was no one in the locker room but just the three of them and whoever was in the shower far on the other side. “They got away,” Keith reported when he came back. It could have been someone just taking a selfie, but they wouldn’t have ran if that was the case.  
  
Lance shivered. “Ick, what a pervert. If you’re gonna do gross shit like that, at least put your phone on silent.”  
  
“No, the answer is you’re not supposed to do shit like that, period,” Shiro corrected dryly, flicking Lance in the forehead.  
  
“Ow!”  
  
“You deserved that,” Keith said, then added remorsefully, “Sorry, Shiro. I couldn’t find the sick freak.”  
  
Shiro shrugged. “If they wanted a pic, they could’ve just asked. But what’s done is done. Hopefully, they got my good side.”  
  
“Hey, they could’ve taken a pic of me, too,” Lance interjected.  
  
“Why would someone choose a string bean over prime beef?” Keith remarked because Lance had walked right into that one with enthusiasm.  
  
“You - !”  
  
“Okay, I’m going to the pool now,” Shiro announced as Keith and Lance continued to bicker.

 

 

 

**8**

Keith maybe would’ve forgotten about the phone incident at the water park because the four of them had a great time, regardless, and he never did see the offender’s face. At that point, there was nothing they could do about it.  
  
Then Monday happened.  
  
Keith entered the student lounge early because his pre-lunch class had been cancelled for the day, and his doofus self still had a bad habit of not checking his emails. There were maybe two people in the room at the moment, a girl focused on her laptop with headphones in her ears. And someone’s stuff on a table not far from where Keith’s group usually sat. Keith wouldn’t have really noticed that little detail except that someone had left their smartphone on the table. A notification lit up their lock screen as Keith was passing by, catching his attention, and he saw the picture of Shiro.  
  
Shiro. Undressing in the locker room at the water park they'd been at yesterday. It was a shitty quality, too, because Shiro had been moving to put his trunks on. Shaky, nervous hands sneaking a pic without being noticed hadn’t helped any. There were many other ways Keith would’ve taken such a pic and achieve far better quality… if he was a gross pervert, that is.  
  
“Hey, put my phone down!”  
  
A mousy guy ran up to him, so small and diminutive that Lance would seem like prime beef if they stood next to each other. Greasy hair and a face full of acne, the perfect stereotype of a college freshman who still had yet to fully bloom into adulthood. The kind of nerd even other nerds wanted nothing to do with because he refused to adhere to basic hygiene standards. He probably didn’t even go to the pool to actually swim, but snap pics of people undressing when they weren’t looking like a perverted rat with a phone. Keith’s initial rage immediately subsided to condescending disinterest. There was no threat here.  
  
“Mind telling me why you got a picture of my friend naked as your lock screen?” Keith asked, voice calm and casual as the kid snatched his phone back.  
  
The kid balked, and Keith wondered if he recognized him from the water park, too. Maybe not. People had a tendency to fade into the background when Shiro entered the room.  
  
“Um… aahhh… I… ah…” He was absolutely shaking. Keith inwardly sneered.  
  
“If you have a thing for Shiro, you could’ve just said something.”  
  
“Wh-what?” Brat looked on the verge of passing out as Keith took a step closer.  
  
“Taking nudes of people without their permission is considered sexual assault, which is a crime, y’know,” Keith continued, voice oh-so calm and steady and reasonable. Friendly, even. “You could be registered as a sex offender. Unable to get a moment’s peace for the rest of your life.”  
  
“Pl-please don’t tell him! Oh my god, I’m so sorry…! I… I just wanted one picture! Just for me! I didn’t put it online or anything, I swear! I’ll delete – “  
  
“Nah, you don’t have to that,” Keith drawled, throwing an arm over his new pal. “I totally get you. And tell you what, I’ll even help you out a little bit – sorry, what’s your name again, kid?”  
  
“Emmet.”  
  
“Well, Emmet, I’m Keith, and what if I told you that you’d have a much better time actually talking to Shiro? People tend to be a little more receptive when you talk to them instead of taking their picture.”  
  
Emmet squirmed beneath Keith’s arm. Keith wanted nothing more than to let the little rat go, but he had other ideas and a trap to set. Like he was just going to let this offense go unpunished. It wasn’t something that could be fixed with just deleting a picture. It went far beyond that now.  
  
“Guys like Shiro don’t notice guys like me,” Emmet whined. “He’s a TA in my Astronomy 102 class, and he hasn’t looked twice at me all semester.”  
**  
**_Because he has a boyfriend, you **nit.**_  
  
“He’s a lot friendlier than that, I promise,” Keith assured him in a voice that dripped with sweet honey from years of practice. “We hang out all the time, and I’d think he’d really enjoy meeting you. You seem like an okay kid. Shiro’s always up for meeting new people. So how about it? Come to my place and hang with us sometime? Order some pizza, play some games, maybe even some Netflix and chill?”  
  
GodDAMN, he hung around Lance way too much.  
  
Emmet snorted, and looked away. Uh oh, Keith was losing him. Then again, if all it took to be noticed by Shiro was to just talk to him, Emmet would’ve done so already. Shiro was very open and friendly, and it was no exaggeration that he enjoyed meeting other people. This rat wasn’t interested in Shiro as a person. And that wasn’t going to stand.  
  
“I don’t quote memes unless I mean them,” Keith continued, and pulled out his phone. Emmet looked on with curiosity as Keith, careful not to show his lock screen, went to a special folder in his gallery. “How’s that? Yeah? You like those?”  
  
Emmet froze as Keith scrolled through the many compromising pics of Shiro he had. Which were a lot. Shiro liked having his picture taken in bed. It was a fun thing between them. Keith was abhorred that he had to use their special moments as bait like this, but worse was the idea of this rat getting away with assaulting his boyfriend. He scrolled through the gallery quickly, giving Emmet a tiny taste but not letting his gaze linger for more than half a second.  
  
“Oh, God…” Emmet moaned, and Keith could see the small bulge tenting his pants.  
  
_P A T H E T I C._  
  
“H-h-how did you even get those?”  
  
“Shiro and I are fucking. _Duh,”_ Keith mocked. “So I got his full permission to take this pics. I told you, he’s _very_ friendly. And sometimes he likes getting distracted from all the stress.”  
  
“College is pretty stressful,” Emmet replied with a nod, licking his lips.  
  
“So how about it? You wanna help him out? He might appreciate it.”  
  
“I dunno,” Emmet said and his hesitation was more than enough for Keith to realize what it was this rat was really after.  
  
_You sick fuck. You don’t have the balls to get to know him or even go to bed with him. You just want fap material._  
  
“I see. Well, if you want copies, you’re gonna have to pay me.”  
  
Now he had Emmet’s FULL attention. No hesitation, no shaking, no looking away, just the complete and undivided attention of a desert traveler gazing upon an oasis. “How much?” Emmet asked in a tone that said he didn’t give a damn how much it cost him, he would like Keith to squeeze out every penny he had for copies of those pics.  
  
“First, I have to print them, obviously. And I’m just not gonna do the exchange out here where everyone can see. I don’t live far from campus, so here’s my address.” Emmet scrambled to record Keith’s contact information, so close to getting a bottle full of that water he was so thirsty for. “Swing by around eight or so, and I’ll have them ready by then.”  
  
“How much?” Emmet asked again.  
  
Keith shrugged. “Eh, we can negotiate when you get there.”  
  
Emmet put his phone away now with Keith’s contact info, and then a thought occurred to him. “Is Shiro okay with this?”  
  
Yeah, like he actually cared. Just a cautious rat making sure it doesn’t get caught.  
  
Keith grinned. “Just don’t post anything online, and Shiro won’t ever have to know.”  
  
Keith watched the rat grab his backpack and scurry away, too focused on the slice of tantalizing cheese to see the obvious trap surrounding it.

 

 

 

**9**  
  
Unsurprisingly, Emmet was a crier, but Keith took delight in each tear.  
  
Outside, the neighborhood dogs started a howl that felt particularly ominous to anyone who heard.  
  
The monster of Roan City had returned.

 

 

 

**10**  
  
It was Monday night and Shiro had an exam on Wednesday, but even so, he really wanted to surprise Keith. His boyfriend seem so… on edge, lately. Keith was a rather prickly one sometimes, but he softened a lot when they were together. But not these days, not since they had gone stargazing and made love like in a power metal ballad for his birthday/Valentine’s Day present.  
  
Shiro had been in enough relationships to recognize this for what it was. Keith was jealous, and Shiro was worried he had given Keith a reason to be jealous. He didn’t think he had, and this was surprising, because Keith hadn’t struck him as the jealous type. In fact, one of the most appealing things about Keith as a boyfriend was how laid back and undemanding he was. It was the very reason he was able to maintain this relationship and still keep his focus on assignments.  
  
They were definitely going to have to talk about this before things escalated. And it wasn’t like Shiro could help the way he looked. He had been popular in high school, popular in the military, and now popular in college. And maybe he was kinda happy that his scarred face still made him somewhat desirable. Maybe he didn’t want other people reminding him how ugly he felt some days. So they needed to talk about this, put their cards on the table, before something twisted between them and they made assumptions they would regret.  
  
Shiro knocked on the door, but there was no answer. The lights weren’t on, either. Had Keith gone out somewhere? Possibly to grab food? His motorcycle was in the driveway. Shiro knocked again. It was only nine, and Keith was a night owl. He couldn’t have gone to bed already.  
  
Well, it wouldn’t hurt to wait for him. Shiro took out the spare key Keith had given him over Christmas and unlocked the door. Shiro hadn’t moved in yet or anything, but Keith gave him the go-ahead to come over whenever he felt like regardless if Keith was there or not. “Keith?” he called as the door creaked open. “Keith, I’m coming in!”  
  
Shiro liked the rancher on most days because as tiny as it was, it felt cozy. Not tonight. For some reason, the house seemed exceptionally dark, the walls converging on him. Even the light from the street lamp just outside couldn’t be seen from within. He heard a sound, and then noticed Tomato pacing up and down the hall, her eyes gleaming in the dark. Her tail flicked with agitation.  
  
And there was a smell. Thick. Hot. Iron. Hanging in the air like a fog.  
  
Shiro choked. He recognized the smell.  
  
And suddenly he was back. Back in the desert with a gun in his hands and the adrenaline pumping as the result of the thrill and the blood –  
  
“Keith!!”  
  
Shiro tore through the house, panic overcoming him. Keith wasn’t in the living room or his room or the bathroom. Not in the kitchen, either.  
  
There were two additional bedrooms in the house. One of them was the master bedroom that was kept up well. The bed was always made, not a wrinkle to be seen on the comforter, pillows stacked neatly against the headboard. The nightstand and the dresser were always clear of dust, the mirror above the vanity shining with clean glass. Keith suspected this was the room his parents used, and he only ever came in here to clean once a week.  
  
The other bedroom was always closed whenever Shiro came over. Because he wasn’t nosey, Shiro never went inside. Keith said it was just an empty room that he couldn’t decide what to put in so there was really no reason to go in there, ever. Keith was using a guest room as his bedroom right now, but he suspected this empty room may have been his nursery. But he wasn’t sure because it was already completely empty when he’d moved in last summer.  
  
In fact, none of the rooms had a crib or were decorated as any kind of nursery whatsoever. Keith didn’t say much about it, but Shiro wondered why his parents continued using the house after giving Keith away. The lack of evidence for a nursery pointed to an answer that was as bleak as it was obvious.  
  
It wasn’t Shiro’s place to judge, but something felt exceptionally cruel to give your son the house he should’ve grown up in to begin with.  
  
That closed door loomed before him now. Like the one belonging to the basement, this door gave Shiro an eerie feeling. The kind of door he shouldn’t open, not if he wanted things to stay the same between him and Keith. But he had to open it. The smell of blood was fermented the entirety of the house. Shiro needed to make sure Keith was alright.  
  
The room wasn’t empty. A bed that was nothing more than a ratty mattress sitting atop a box spring was the only furniture. And covering the walls and ceiling were dozens upon dozens of blown up pictures of Shiro. Shiro stuffing his face with pizza, Shiro working out at the gym, Shiro showing off his muscles to be ridiculous, Shiro smiling, Shiro laughing, Shiro nuzzling several variations of an unamused Keith, Shiro, Shiro, Shiro…  
  
And the biggest one of all was on the ceiling. A poster-sized version of the selfie Keith and Shiro had taken together at the amusement park way back before Thanksgiving, the Kerberos roller coaster looping around and around behind them.  
  
“Keith…”  
  
What was he supposed to say? How was he supposed to process this? Was this love?  
  
He heard the kitchen screen door slam, and Shiro quickly closed the door to that very not-empty room. “Keith?”  
  
“Shiro?”  
  
Keith stood in the kitchen completely covered in mud. “Ugh, I’m so glad you’re here. Can you, like, do me a favor and carry me to the shower? I don’t wanna get the floor – “  
  
He stopped. “Why do you have a freaky look on your face?”  
  
Shiro shook his head. “Sorry, um, you didn’t answer, and I guess I got kinda worried because your motorcycle is still here.”  
  
Keith’s eyes widened like a puppy’s. “Oh, babe, I’m so sorry. I didn’t hear you. I’ve been out back in the garden.”  
  
“Have you been fighting the garden?” Shiro couldn’t help joking because he kinda wanted to scream at the moment.  
  
“Kinda. I’ve been neglecting it a little bit.”  
  
“Does it have to do with this weird smell in your house?”  
  
That came out a little more accusatory than Shiro had intended. Keith stared at him a long moment and the silence was chilling.  
  
“So you will not fucking believe this, but while I was at your place this weekend, a damn raccoon got in the basement. It must’ve cut itself on a tool or something because it bled out all over the place by the time I got back. I’ve been meaning to clean that basement for a while now, but, um, honestly, basements kinda freak me out.”  
  
“You’re a horror movie fanatic, though.”  
  
“Yes! That is precisely why I am cautious around basements! I pay attention!”  
  
“Maybe I’ll help you clean it one day, and you won’t be so scared.”  
  
Keith gave him this look that was completely and totally unreadable. It was like his soul had just left his body, like something invisible suddenly wiped his expressions clean and he might as well not have a face at all. Honestly, it kinda freaked Shiro out even more.  
  
“Yeah. Maybe. When I feel up to it. Thanks, babe.”  
  
Keith grinned at him, and Shiro decided he wasn’t going to address the not-empty room at this moment. It was probably just the raccoon smell getting to him. So what if Keith had a bajillion photos of them printed out and dedicated a room to that? It was a little over the top, but if that’s how Keith, who wasn’t all that romantic to begin with, wanted to show his feelings, then what was the big deal? None of those pictures had been taken without Shiro’s awareness. And Keith would never do anything to him.  
  
Keith would _never_ hurt him.  
  
“Hey, let’s get outta here, and you can take a shower at the dorms.” He winked. “With me.”  
  
“And get caught by your RA again?” Keith’s grin widened wolfishly. “I’m down.”

 

 

 

**11**  
  
The pair lay tangled in Shiro’s full-sized bed, basking in afterglow, Keith sprawled over Shiro’s chest and practically purring, Shiro gently tracing his finger up and down the curve of Keith’s spine. Keith had been especially eager tonight, loud and demanding and a little rough. Points of Shiro’s body were going to ache in the morning, marked with red bites. His legs hurt a bit after having been stretched to his ears, bruises on his thighs from Keith gripping him while slamming into him with a particularly desperate fervor. Like Keith was chasing a deeper kind of release than the physical kind.  
  
Keith sighed, and Shiro kissed the top of his head.  
  
“I have a question.”  
  
“Hmm?” Keith mumbled, eyes still closed.  
  
“Actually, more of a confession.”  
  
Now Keith’s eyes opened with intrigue. “Yeah?”  
  
“I saw the room.”  
  
Probably not the most elegant way to go about it, because Keith immediately went stiff in Shiro’s arms. Then he rose himself up to gaze down at Shiro, those indigo eyes Shiro had fallen hard for the moment he first saw them searching his face.  
  
“Does it freak you out?” Keith asked very, very quietly. “Are you mad?”  
  
Shiro shook his head. “No. It’s just… unexpected.”  
  
“Heh.” Keith traced circles over Shiro’s chest. “I guess I went a little crazy when we were apart for Thanksgiving. And I’ve been too lazy to take it down. I liked you a lot, even back then.”  
  
“Aw, you’re actually being really sweet right now.”  
  
“Don’t you dare.”  
  
“It’s – “  
  
“Don’t you say it!”  
  
Shiro rolled until Keith was beneath him, kissing his boyfriend deeply. Keith moaned softly as Shiro’s lips dragged along his jaw and up to his ear. Shiro rolled his tongue over the shell of that ear and whispered, “It’s cute~”  
  
“AAAAGGGHHH.”

 

 

 

**12**

  
That night Shiro had the weirdest dreams.  
  
Dreams about fat raccoons that bled bright, bright red tomato sauce.

 

 

 

**13**  
  
Poor, stupid Emmet was supposed to be the only one, having to pay for what he’d done to Shiro.  
  
Unfortunately, that wouldn’t wash with the beast inside that had been docile for far too long. Shiro was supposed to have been the perfect victim, and now that he was no longer on the menu, it was time to sate it with others.  
  
Winter finally, reluctantly started moving over for spring, and the disappearances of Roan City citizens had begun anew. The terror the community had foolishly believed left them now had come back to haunt their nights once more. Students at the campus were instructed to never go anywhere alone. Everyone was obligated to report anything suspicious, and in a small college town such as this, the slightest step out of place was considered suspicious.  
  
But no one ever suspected Keith. Shy, but friendly Keith. Cute, a little popular, good grades. The fact that his victims always went willingly to his house to spend their last moments helped his alibi.  
  
Going to a friend’s house is normal. People only care about what happens outside the norm.

 

 

 

**14**  
  
If everything began at that Denny’s, then it only made sense that everything would come to an end there, too.


	5. Part 5

**1**  
  
April Fool’s Day had arrived, but not everyone was in the spirit of celebrating, not even the usual tricksters, and those who were couldn’t get much of a laugh out of others. After four months of absolute silence, people had begun disappearing again, and that was all campus could talk about. Two more victims had been done in, although no bodies had been found yet. The police were convinced that this was the work of a copy-cat, that’s why there had been unusual silence for a long time.  
  
In other words, they had no idea what was going on, either.  
  
Without bodies, without a murder weapon, without any links between victims, there were just no leads, nothing to go with. Not that they would say so out loud and cause a panic. But everyone knew that things didn’t work as smoothly as they did on scripted crime television. If they did, there wouldn’t be so many cold cases crowding the abandoned filing cabinets.  
  
“I wonder if it’s romance.”  
  
Keith stared up from his lunch, a string of spaghetti noddles still hanging from his mouth. “What?’  
  
Shiro grinned as he swirled his own noodles around with his fork while the couple sat at their usual table for lunch in the campus cafeteria, watching the news. The journalists were speculating the possible links between the victims: income, acquaintances, living area, the usual boring stuff. Not something exciting. Like romance.  
  
Keith narrowed his eyes. “You’re such a nerd,” he deadpanned.  
  
“I’m serious, though!” Shiro protested with a laugh. “What if it’s like a jealous suitor thing? What if they were all attracted to the same person or something, that the killer didn’t like that?”  
  
Keith was giving him an unreadable expression. The blank one. Like back at his house when he was having raccoon issues.  
  
“You’ve been playing Yandere Simulator instead of studying for your Advance Aerodynamics exam, haven’t you? _Haven't you?”_  
  
“You don’t understand!” Shiro cried as a meatball was launched at him. “If I don’t beat Pidge’s high score, I have to do her laundry for a month!”  
  
“Why would you agree to such a bet!?”  
  
“Oh, like any of us can say ‘no’ to Pidge!”  
  
Keith ducked as a meatball was fired right back at him.  
  
“Hey!” One of the cafeteria workers yelled from her mop. “Either eat your food or take your gross flirting elsewhere!”  


 

 

**2**  
  
Shiro felt it was a bit too soon, too much to say that he was “happy”.  
  
“Happy” was one of those words reserved for people who actually deserved happiness, for people who led untainted lives free of blood stains.  
  
Shiro could still see them when he closed his eyes, sometimes even when he just blinked. The faces of the men he had killed. There were so many excuses. So many. These men were the enemy. He had only been doing his job as a member of Air Force Security Forces. He was only keeping his country safe just as he had signed up for, swore to do when they awarded him with the rank and title of Airman after graduating basic training six years ago. And he had always been a good guy. He never hurt anyone, never took advantage of everyone, looked out for his brothers and sisters in arms as they worked hard and played hard. And when they sent him overseas several times, he fulfilled his duty just as he was supposed to. And the people he killed, if he hadn’t they would have been free to destroy more and more innocents. Sometimes to protect the many, you have to destroy the few that threaten them and their livelihood.

Details. Filler material. 

It wasn’t that Shiro had killed mass murderers out of duty to his country and his people. It wasn’t that Shiro killed those to keep his wingmen and civilians safe.  
  
It was that he enjoyed killing them.  
  
Because killing someone felt _good._  
  
The excitement of going into a combat zone, of lurking around dark corners waiting for an unsuspecting enemy to get to close and then –  
  
No one had ever told him how good it would feel. And he didn’t blame them if they’d felt the same. It was the ultimate, most forbidden thrill.   
  
Shiro would close his eyes and see their faces. Or, sometimes, what as left of their faces. And with sickening shock, he felt absolutely no remorse. Not remorse for having to die in the first place, they made their own decision in that regard, but no remorse for the way they had died. So brutally and inhumane. Shiro had relished in their pain. He would always kill them quickly because rescuing a village left no time to torture anyone, but he made sure their death _hurt._ Something that they would feel all the way to the afterlife.  
  
Then during his last deployment, something went wrong. His convoy had hit an IED. Two of his wingmen died, including his supervisor, a hearty Master Sergeant who always spoke so happily of home and his adorable family waiting for him, and a young Senior Airman who had just received orders to Japan once her deployment was over. Iverson and Ahn. Good people. Good people who shouldn’t have had to die like that.  
  
Shiro had lived but shrapnel fucked him up sideways into Tuesday. Tore up his face. The overturned vehicle had crushed his arm. The driver had been thrown and only received a few scratches. Nothing could be done for Iverson and Ahn, but the driver, a kid by the name of Montgomery, desperately performed SABC until medics could rescue them. Funny, Shiro didn’t remember Montgomery being this good during exercises. Something about the pressure of real life makes people either lose their shit or snap into sharp focus, and luckily for Shiro, the latter had been true for Montgomery.  
  
He was first flown to Rammstein AFB, the biggest military hospital in the world, in critical condition. After several weeks when his condition had improved, he was then transferred to the States. He wondered if it had been at his father’s request. Considering he had ended up in the hospital his father ran, he didn’t doubt it. It was touching that his family wanted to oversee his recovery themselves.  
  
Shirogane senior had pulled some strings and then Shiro’s arm was being fitted for a new kind of prosthetic, a robotic technological advancement perhaps decades ahead of its time. He didn’t want to know what kind of money his parents had to spend for such a thing. The VA sure as hell didn’t have the kind of funding for something like this. But his parents refused to tell him, insisting that he only focus on his recovery.  
  
It kind of hurt, actually. The tingling sensation of the damaged nerves of his amputated arm and the artificial nerves of the robot arm coming together was next to unbearable, like constant pins and needles that wouldn’t fade away no matter what he did. And when it finally had started to fade, the replacing itch was even worse. No amount of cool tech would ever make his arm less than repulsive to him. It had been like waking up in a nightmare of a science fiction gone horribly wrong, waking up to an arm that did not belong to him.  
  
Then there was his face. Advanced plastic surgery could restore most of it, except for the scar across his nose where his skull had almost been cleaved in half by the metal that settled there. They shaved his hair for the several operations that had to be done, but the hair at the front grew back white instead of the natural black like the rest. People would often comment that it made him look like a particular comic book character, but honestly, Shiro hated it. He tried to dye it but the color never lasted long, and eventually he gave up trying altogether.  
  
His face, his arm, both reminders of the kind of creature he had been. Maybe it was for the better that he didn’t try to hide those things.

But the worst of all had been the feeling of absolute emptiness when he'd been discharged from the military. The Air Force had been his home, a huge part of his identity. They were his ticket to go to space, to that sky full of infinite stars he had been in love with since he was a child sitting in the window with a hardcover children's science book about the galaxy.

He won't ever go to space now. Or serve the military again. He had nothing. Just a robot arm and bad hair.

That's why he lived in the university dorms still. Why he hadn't tried to get his own place or even a car yet. After a year and a half, his discharge back to the civilian sector still felt too raw. He wasn't ready to set down roots yet. 

He took everything slow. Trying to get used to this new life he had no choice but to live.  
  
First, when he recovered, he went back to school. Engrossing himself in finishing his degree kept the memories, the nightmares at bay. He would often go to bed too exhausted to dream at all. Second, he re established his connection with his family, his parents and his brother who never gave up on him, constantly worried about him even when he had vanished from their lives for a while to recollect himself. Thanksgiving had been nothing but them catching up with him, bringing him back into the family, spending their holidays as they had when he had been a child.  
  
And finally, there was Keith.  
  
Keith.  
  
Fiery, contradictory, wonderful Keith.  
  
Who was as fierce as he was sweet. Who cared for so much and lived each day so passionately. Who could one moment be confident and then become so shy. Who let Shiro see his vulnerable side when others did not have such a privilege. Who just… filled his days with something to new to experience.  
  
Shiro wouldn’t dare say he was happy.  
  
But with Keith, he was something close to it.  


 

 

**3**  
  
Keith was acting really, erm, intense these days.  
  
Shiro wouldn’t exactly call it weird or even odd. But something was off. As if the last time they screwed in his dorm room hadn’t been enough of a clue, Keith had been a little more intense than usual. When they made love, Keith seemed to force more and more control, regardless of the position they took. Which was fine with Shiro, but he liked taking the reins every now and again, too.  
  
“Stop complaining and let me take care of you,” Keith had snapped when Shiro brought up his concerns. In bed. In the middle of things. Because Shiro really needed to work on timing things better.  
  
“But you, um, okay…” Shiro had mumbled and tried to forget about it as Keith had resumed working on him. He had meant to say that Keith was always taking care of him. Like he was worried about something.  
  
Shiro had come to find that whenever Keith was worried about something, he tended to go about his daily routines with extra intensity whether it be sex, cooking, or even watching their Netflix shows with none of the chilling.  
  
But what really stood out was when the two of them went out somewhere together, whether on dates or with the rest of the group. Especially after their double-date at the water park.  
  
One particular incident that really stood out was when they had gone back to the Galra. Outside from their romantic or cute, funsie dates, the nightclub was pure sensuality for the two of them, a night where they would seduce the dickens out of each other and then stumble back to Keith's place drunk and desperate. It was a night of pure lust, where all sweetness is thrown out the window so they could screw each other's brains out. Keith had been grinding up on Shiro on the dance floor all night like he was already getting started, already challenging Shiro to last.  
  
A girl had approached Shiro when he had taken a much needed break at the bar (otherwise they weren't going to make it back home at this rate, and Shiro was going to find them a dark corner, and public indecency laws be damned). She was around his age, pretty, about as drunk as everyone else in this club, makeup running a little due to the sweat on her face. She was friendly, and they chatted lightly while waiting for the bartender to serve up their drinks. Then idle chatter turned to flirting, and then she started to express obvious interest in him. In a previous life, Shiro might have taken her up on whatever she was offering. He usually preferred the company of other men, but soft, friendly women were absolutely his type. That was in a past life, even if he didn't have a boyfriend. Then again, he wouldn't be here in the first place if it wasn't for Keith.  
  
He rejected her gently. He had a boyfriend, after all. And as fun as flirting could be when people were simply having a good time together, Shiro would never betray that trust.  
  
She didn't listen to him, to put it politely. Very, very politely.  
  
“Is your boyfriend bi, too? Maybe the three of us can have fun together.”  
  
Keith was pansexual, actually, as well as very picky and rather possessive. It wouldn't be a good idea, at all. And even if Keith didn't care, Shiro did. That he was actually allowing himself to be in a relationship now, at this point in his life, was complicated enough with one person without adding more.  
  
No matter what Shiro said, this girl just wouldn't let him go.  
  
And then her friend showed up. At the same time, so did Keith, impatient with wondering what was taking Shiro so damn long with their drinks.  
  
A fight didn't break out or anything so dramatic, but Keith did have a few colorful words reflecting how he felt about some random stranger trying to pick up his boyfriend. Eventually, Shiro had to tug him away. The girl, yelling angrily, was tugged away by her friend, who wouldn't stop apologizing sheepishly for this outrageous behavior.  
  
Shiro and Keith ended up going home shortly after. Shiro thought the mood was ruined… and then Keith shoved him on the bed, tying his wrists to the bedposts with red cord. Keith kissed him roughly, biting his lip, and Shiro whimpered.  
_  
__“Mine,”_ Keith growled.  


 

 

**4**  
  
“Keith, what is this? Why is your floor so dirty?”  
  
Shiro had been on his way to the kitchen to put up his dirty plate, and now he was pointing out some dark stains on the floor just by the basement door. It had only been a few days since the nightclub incident, and Shiro didn't remember those stains behind there when he had been here last.  
  
“Oh, I think it’s from that raccoon I found,” Keith remarked, cleaning off the dinner table. “It had been bleeding all over the place.”  
  
“Looks almost fresh.”  
  
“I murdered someone.”  
  
Shiro looked at Keith’s very serious face.  
  
“Aha, don’t be cute,” Shiro shot back dryly.  
  
Keith shrugged. “Well, it’s either that or the raccoon.”  
  
“I just worry about you sometimes, especially with all these disappearances.”  
  
Keith barked a laugh. “Aw, baby, don’t be worried about me. I can handle anybody, you know this.”  
  
“It’s just that you’re so cute, I wouldn’t blame anyone for trying to kidnap you.”  
  
“First you tell me not to be cute, and now you’re calling me ‘cute’, you need to make up your damn mind, old man. Also, stop hanging around Lance, you are killing me with those horrible lines.”  
  
Shiro snorted. “Lance wishes he was as smooth as me.”  
  
“… get out of my house.”  


 

 

**5**  
  
The next evening when Shiro had come over for dinner again, there was a knock on Keith's door. “Keith?” Shiro called out. When there was no answer because Keith was still in the bathroom, Shiro gently pushed Red off his lap to go answer the door himself. Tomato glared at him, her fluffy tail whipping indignantly.  
  
The knocking continued, urgent. Shiro opened the door, and he immediately recognized one of the girls from the club, the friend who had pulled Miss Persistent away from what could have escalated into a very embarrassing situation. Her eyes were puffy and red, like she had been crying hard.  
  
“I'm so sorry for bothering you like this,” she said, eyes brimming with fresh tears. “Shiro? It was Shiro, right, from the Galra? I don't know if you remember Amber, she talked with you at the bar, and kinda… um… “  
  
Shiro nodded. “Of course, I remember. And you're Risa, her friend she was with.”  
  
Risa smiled wide, with relief. “Oh, thank God, you remember! I had no idea what I was going to do if you didn't!”  
  
“Did something happen?”  
  
“She's missing!” Risa burst into a fresh wave of tears. “She’s been missing for days now, and I can't find her, at all! The police are no help, they're so busy with the Roan City cases… I think she might be - !”  
  
“Here, why don't you come in?” Shiro offered, stepping to the side. “I could get you something to drink.”  
  
But Risa shook her head, even took a step back. Shiro was, after all, a complete stranger in a town plagued by a serial kidnapper-maybe-murderer. “No, it’s okay. I'm okay. I just need to know if you've seen her is all.”  
  
Shiro shook his head. “I’m sorry, Risa. I haven’t.”  
  
She sniffed a few times, then nodded. “Okay. It’s just that… well…”  
  
He waited for her to get her thoughts together.  
  
“She received a call from you. Telling her to meet her here. So you can make up for what happened at the club.”  
  
“Wha - ?”  
  
Risa’s eyes immediately dried up, dark and cold. “How could you? Amber didn’t mean anything she said that night. She was going through a really rough time with her ex, and had a bit too much to drink. If you were playing some kind of joke on her – “  
  
“I never called her,” Shiro interrupted, mind freezing in place.  
  
He vaguely remembered Amber putting her number in Shiro’s phone despite his protests. He had meant to erase it immediately, but then had gotten caught up with Keith.  
  
Risa’s eyes narrowed. “Are you shittin’ me, right now?”  
  
“No. I never called her,” Shiro insisted.  
  
“She said that it was you!”  
  
“If I knew where she was, if I had seen her, I would tell you. I don’t know anything about calling her, but I promise you that I haven’t seen her since that night, and I'm not the one who called her. I have a _boyfriend.”_

Hell, Shiro only really identified as bi because of the few times he had been attracted to certain women. Otherwise, he was gayer than Christmas garland.  
  
Her dark eyes searched his face before going back to their gentle brown as she believed what he said. “Okay. If she calls you, somehow, you’ll let me know?” And she handed Shiro a small business card with her name and number, probably something she handed to everyone she was questioning about Amber’s whereabouts.  
  
“Absolutely,” Shiro promised.  
  
He shut the door as Risa walked away, and turned around to see Keith back on the couch, watching him with unreadable eyes. “What was that all about?” he asked, and there was something about how casual his question sounded that infuriated Shiro.  
  
Keith could be glib sometimes. But downright callous was not his nature. At least, Shiro hadn’t thought so.  
  
“I think you know.”  
  
Shiro wasn’t trying to sound accusatory, but his point got across all the same, making Keith sit straight up. Tomato jumped off his lap, once again indignant that these humans just wouldn’t let her get comfortable.  
  
“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” Keith snapped.  
  
No point in stopping now. Then again, it wasn’t just this incident. Keith’s possessiveness had been bordering on irritating for a while now, and Shiro’s mounting frustration with Keith’s complete disregard of his concerns forced all of it to the surface. “Did you call that girl pretending to be me? As some kind of prank to get back at her for hitting on me?”  
  
Keith wouldn’t do that. Shiro knew he wouldn’t. It was so childish. And a little crazy. Shiro waited for Keith to deny it, yell at him for saying something so stupid, they would have a small fight about it, and then move on.  
  
“So what if I did?”  
  
Shiro stared. He could only stare.  
  
Keith shrugged. “I saw her number on your phone, and, like you said, pranked her. It’s no big deal.”  
  
“She’s _missing,_ Keith!”  
  
“And that sucks, but it was just a prank. She didn’t even come by the house, so she probably knew it.”  
  
Shiro took a deep breath. “Okay, but. You pretended to be _me.”_  
  
“I’m sorry?”  
  
“You’re not seeing a problem with that?”  
  
Keith frowned, then glanced away. “Sorry. Whatever. It was a dumb prank, I keep telling you. Don’t lecture me. You’re my boyfriend, not my dad.”  
  
If Shiro had loved Keith any less, he would have erupted then and there. As such, all he could do was shake until his teeth chattered in his skull. “I am not lecturing you, I am pissed off that you used me to play a cruel joke on someone, who had just gone missing!”  
  
Without giving Keith another glance, he yanked the closet open, grabbed his jacket and started putting on his shoes.  
  
“Wait, you’re leaving?” Keith cried.  
  
“Yes. I think… I think it’s for the best if we spend some time apart for a while.  
  
Keith was on his feet now, looking panicked. “Shiro, wait! I’m sorry! It was stupid of me to do that, I’m sorry!”  
  
Too late now.  
  
“It’s not just that, Keith,” Shiro replied softly. “You’ve been acting possessive and jealous for a while now. And I can’t deal with that anymore. Especially not while I’m trying to graduate. It’s too much.”  
  
“Are you breaking up with me?”  
  
Keith’s tone was less of a question and more of a statement, and it was enough to break Shiro’s heart and almost – almost – make him change his mind.  
  
“No, but I do want a break. I think we both need a break so we can reevaluate where this relationship is going.”  
  
They needed to set hard boundaries, something they hadn’t done since this chaotic whirlwind of a romance had budded between them. They had gotten so used to things happening naturally, they had grown complacent with each other, assuming things and crossing lines that shouldn’t be crossed in healthy relationships.  
  
So Shiro made the first move, not looking back and ignoring his aching heart as he walked out the door and left Keith standing alone in the living room.  


 

 

**6**  
  
If there was anything sadder than not-quite-breaking-up with your boyfriend seemingly out of nowhere, it was sitting in Denny’s all alone without said boyfriend, ordering mac-and-cheese off the kid's menu at age 25. But Denny’s had such good mac-and-cheese, perfect comfort food even if his guts sometimes cried out otherwise. And Shiro needed all the comfort food he could stomach.  
  
He couldn’t concentrate on school. The very thing he had been relying on to keep away his nightmares and thoughts of what he used to be could do nothing about his relationship problems. His mind refused to work, instead went back to Keith. He shouldn’t have left things like that. He had just been so angry, but he should have controlled his emotions, talked things rationally.  
  
“I’m so stupid,” Shiro lamented under his breath and took another big bite of golden, cheesy comfort. Stupid, stupid. It felt like they had been apart for weeks, but it had only been two days since he walked out of that door. Keith had not contacted him at all, either. Not that night, not yesterday, nothing today. No texts, no Snapchats, nothing. He hadn’t even seen Keith in the student lounge.  
  
“You’re _fighting!?”_ Pidge had cried. “Oh my God, and just when Lance and Hunk had finally made up, too! What is with our group these days!?”  
  
Shiro had been tempted on more than one occasion to text Keith, tell him that they had to talk. But each time he picked up his phone, Shiro put it back down again. No. They needed a break, and he had meant that. Pining over Keith like this only emphasized that point.  
  
“You’re here alone.”  
  
Shiro looked up to see Jake the Waiter smiling at him. “I never see you here without your boyfriend,” he added gently.  
  
It was none of Jake’s business, but Shiro had seen him working here often enough that the comment didn’t feel invasive at all. Shiro sighed. “Yeah, we’re kinda taking a small break right now.”  
  
“Oh. That sucks, dude. Sorry.”  
  
Shiro shrugged. “It is what it is.”  
  
“Well, if you ever wanna get things off your chest, you know where to find me,” Jake offered. “Working here. Probably for the rest of my life.”  
  
Jake made a face, and Shiro chuckled. Jake had been working at this Denny’s since Shiro had started attending the university, lasting longer than any other employee he had seen including some managers. Shiro was surprised Jake didn’t actually own the place yet.

Alone again, Shiro shoved another sorrowful spoonful of mac-and-cheese in his mouth. It made him feel a bit better. 

But not much.

  


 

**7**  
  
Eventually, Shiro did take Jake up on his offer. Instead of going to the cafeteria for lunch, Shiro would stop by Denny’s and chat over a coffee during Jake’s break. Shiro felt guilty about burdening his other friends with his relationship problems. After all, they were friends with Keith, too, and he didn’t want them to feel like he was forcing them in the middle. He had only talked to Allura, just because she was Keith’s best friend and she had insisted to know what was going on between the two. Even then, Shiro kind of downplayed the situation.  
  
Jake was safe to talk to. Shiro could be more honest about his feelings without putting his friends in an awkward position.  
  
“It sounds to me,” Jake said one rainy afternoon, “that this kid is too young for you.”  
  
Shiro blinked. “What do you mean?”  
  
“Well, you just turned twenty-five, right? And he’s still eighteen? Now, I’m not judging whatsoever, but that’s quite the age gap there. Again, no judging. He just seems really immature compared to you, who’s in a whole ‘nother stage in his development.”  
  
Shiro wasn’t sure if he agreed. He and Keith had meshed together very well so far. They were pretty compatible, despite their age difference. Then again, the possessiveness, the jealous pranks, definitely spoke of a mind that didn’t have the maturity to handle certain setbacks. This was their first fight, after all, and the first time Shiro considered that maybe dating someone so much younger than him probably hadn’t been one of his better ideas.  
  
But leaving Keith was just absolutely out of the question.  
  
“I know I don’t know you guys that well,” Jake continued, “but for what it’s worth, maybe you need to do what’s best for the both you, y’know?” He gave Shiro a friendly, reassuring smile. “It’ll work out in the end.”  
  
Shiro smiled back. “Thanks, man.”  
  
“Hey, always happy to lend an ear.”  
  
Jake went back to work, leaving Shiro with his thoughts and the rest of his lunch. Then Shiro went to the bathroom real quick to relieve himself before another afternoon lecture.  
  
When he came back to grab the check, a white flower was lying on the table he had been sitting at, and Jake was nowhere to be seen. On the check, a winky face had been drawn, next to a phone number.  


 

 

**8**  
  
“That guy’s hitting on you.”  
  
It had been almost a week since Shiro had spoken to Keith. Honestly, it was starting to depress him really bad. Shiro hadn’t seen Keith on campus at all, although Hunk had assured him that Keith was going to class, he was just the type of guy who could easily avoid anyone for months at a time if he wanted to.  
  
Now Lance had cornered Shiro in the lounge, peering at him with a suspicious glare in his blue eyes.  
  
“What guy?” Shiro asked innocently.  
  
“Um, duh, the guy at Denny’s. Allura and I saw you two sittin’ together at lunch the other day.” Lance’s eyes narrowed more. “You’re not cheatin’ on Keith, are ya? I thought you two were just taking a break.”  
  
“I’m not and we are,” Shiro replied with an exasperated sigh. This was precisely why he had avoided talking to any of them about Keith. Not just because they would be put in a weird position, but he might also be blamed for what happened. Allura and Lance were especially protective of Keith, as it were, no matter how much they both liked Shiro. Which was why Shiro hadn't mentioned the flower to anyone. He'd even left it on the table, walking away and pretending that had not just happened.  
  
“Then who’s this Jack guy?”  
  
“Jake, and he’s just a friend.”  
  
“Allura doesn’t think he seems to think that, and I agree. He totally wants your sweet, prime beef bod!”  
  
“Uh-huh.”  
  
Lance flopped back in his chair with a groan. “Look, bro, you have been amazing for Keith ever since you two met. He’s the happiest that we’ve ever seen him, and that’s sayin’ quite a bit since he’s usually such an emo. You’re a great couple and good for each other and all that other stuff. Allura and I, we’ve both known Keith for years, since before college. We don’t wanna see him hurt. And we don’t wanna see you hurt, either, because you’re one of us, too, yeah? So don’t let this asshole weasel his way between you guys.”  
  
Shiro stared at Lance before giving him an appreciative smile. “I won’t let him. I promise.”  
  
As soon as he had a private moment, Shiro unlocked his phone and sent Keith a message:

> **Space Nerd:** Hey. How have you been? Let’s meet up and talk. There’s something I want to tell you, but I want to in person.  
> 

That he loved him.  
  
He was going to tell Keith that he loved him. And that he wanted this between them to work.  


 

 

**9**  
  
Shiro’s heart had been racing in his throat when Keith had texted him back to arrange a meeting place for them to talk. Denny’s, unsurprisingly. A neutral place they could both easily meet up at. And the place where it all began between them. It seemed fitting for what Shiro had to say.  
  
He decided to wait for Keith outside instead of going in. He was much to nervous to sit still, anyway, and the cool spring evening air kept him from sweating too much.  
  
“Hey, stranger!”  
  
It wasn’t Keith greeting him so enthusiastically, but Jake the Waiter. Shiro gave a small wave back, knowing it was futile to hope Jake would just walk on inside and not strike up a conversation. Shiro was sure if he talked too much, he would throw up.  
  
“Whatcha doin’?” Jake inquired, doing exactly what Shiro had hoped he wouldn’t.  
  
“Waiting for Keith,” Shiro replied simply, hoping the guy would take the hint. Even if Shiro was on the market for a new boyfriend, while Jake was a good dude, Shiro just wasn’t interested in him at all. Just one of those people who would make a fine friend, and nothing more than that.  
  
“Ah, the boyfriend?”  
  
“Uh-huh.”  
  
Now, go away, please.  
  
Only, Jake didn’t go away. Shiro had been just about to say so out loud, too nervous and too annoyed to put up with this for much longer, when Jake stepped closer to him.  
  
“Sorry, Shiro. But I think you’re making a mistake waiting for some jerk when you can have someone who actually cares for you.”  
  
Two things happened.  
  
One, Shiro turned to snap at Jake for daring to speak that way about Keith especially when he only had superficial knowledge of their relationship at best when Shiro had confided in him about their issues.  
  
Two, Jake had stepped closer to Shiro to tug at his shirt and easily press their mouths together, something Shiro had not seen coming no matter how much Lance had warned him. He thought Jake had more respect for him than that.  
  
As such, the shock made Shiro stand still longer than he should have, long enough to feel that Jake’s lips were chapped and his mouth tasted like peppermint and stale cigarettes. Then he pushed Jake away. “What the hell!?” He cried, breathing hard and rubbing his arm over his mouth to wipe the unwanted kiss away. He wanted to punch Jake’s lights out. He probably should have. But he was still too stunned to move much.  
  
Then again, did he have a right to be shocked by this? Jake had only ever interested in Shiro’s fraying relationship with Keith. The flower. The contact info. The flirting even back on that first night Shiro and Keith had met.  
  
“I’m sorry, Shiro,” Jake replied softly, “but it’s the only way I could think of for you to finally understand how I feel. I’ve waited for you for so long, and I can’t wait anymore. You didn't even take my flower. Or call me.”  
  
“Then you should’ve given up,” Shiro shot back coldly when he was able to regain himself. “Come near me again, and I will not be responsible for what Keith does to you.”  
  
Shiro stormed away, still trying to keep his rage under control. At the crosswalk, before the light turned green, he pulled out his phone to tell Keith that he wouldn’t be able to meet up with him today.  
  
There was no way he could discuss things and confess his feelings for Keith. Not after that.  


 

 

**10**  
  
The next day, Shiro was convinced Keith knew about what had happened with Jake. Because Shiro never received any kind of response after agreeing to meet up with him at Denny’s. Radio silence once again. Keith was angry. And Keith could hold a grudge for a long, long time.  
  
“I’ll kill him myself!” Allura cried when Shiro couldn’t contain it anymore and told his friends what had happened. “How dare he force himself upon you like that!”  
  
Lance tugged her back down on her chair before she marched off to Denny’s to do just that, promising that they would kill Jake the Waiter later when there were no witnesses.  
  
“Oh my God, dude, I’m so sorry,” Pidge breathed.  
  
“Keith will understand,” Hunk added. “He knows you’re faithful, none of that was your fault.”  
  
“Then why won’t Keith respond to my messages?” Shiro moaned helplessly, head lying on the table in utter defeat.  
  
The others glanced at each other with uncertain gazes.  
  
“He’ll come around,” Hunk replied. “Although, he hasn’t really talked to any of us lately, either.”  
  
Now that was surprising. Shiro lifted his head, echoing, “He hasn’t?”   
  
The four glanced at each other again, and this time, it was Allura who spoke. “When Keith gets upset, like very, very upset, he has a habit of isolating himself from everyone else. Including me. I think it’s a defense mechanism of his, to keep people from seeing just how deeply things can affect him. The last time he isolated himself like this was when… was when he met his father.”  
  
Shiro’s jaw dropped. Even the others were staring as if this was news to them, too. “His father?"

"Uh-huh. Last summer."

"That was when his father gave him the family house.”  
  
Allura nodded. “And I’m sure you saw the lack of a nursery, didn’t you? When I finally managed to get Keith to talk to me about it, he admitted that the reunion hadn’t been what he’d imagined. His father had been rather… cold for a man who had just found his only child after so long. Keith feels that his father came back out of obligation, not out of any kind of actual love. He was always afraid that his parents didn’t want him, or rather, that he was less important to them than whatever they had going on that made them leave him. Still, he had hoped this wasn’t the case, and it might not be, but his father hasn’t given him a reason to think otherwise.”  
  
“Poor Keith,” Pidge muttered. “I had no idea.”  
  
“Yeah, me neither,” Lance added while Hunk nodded in agreement.  
  
“Trust me, he wouldn’t have told me, either, if I didn’t have my ways,” Allura pointed out. “A man is quick to spill his guts when you have his elbows locked behind his back just so.”  
  
“Hmm, that he does,” Lance agreed and then yelped with Pidge kicked him hard.  
  
“So what do I do?” Shiro asked helplessly. “If I can’t bring Keith out, it might be weeks before he speaks to me again. But I feel like if I push things, it’ll only end up pushing him away. If he still needs space, I don’t want to take that away from him.”  
  
Allura gave Shiro a wide, gleeful grin. “Oh, I’ve got you completely covered there, Shiro. As you know, my going away party is this weekend. Keith knows I will absolutely kill him if he doesn’t show his face at _my_ going away.”  
  
“I kinda feel like sending you in is a bit extreme considering he can’t say ‘no’ to you ever,” Hunk pointed out.  
  
Allura dismissed his concerns with a wave. “It will be fine. Keith will come to the party, run into Shiro, and things will just fall into place naturally from there.” She smiled at Lance. “I can trust you to make Shiro look extra handsome that night, can’t I, darling?”  
  
Lance grinned. “Oh, you got it, babe. Keith’s gonna take one look at Shiro and be reminded of everything he’s been missing.”  
  
“Oh, oh, Pidge and I can work on the lights and music,” Hunk volunteered. “Gotta set that mood.”  
  
And the group continued to talk excitedly as “Operation Bring Shiro and Keith Back Together” (they couldn’t think of anything that was less than a mouthful for their big scheme).  


 

 

**11**  
  
“Sit still!”  
  
Shiro used to be really good at sitting still. Like really good. You know, back in the day when he was killing people for a living. Perhaps that was why he could barely sit still now anymore. Also, he never really had makeup put on him like this. “I don’t wanna look too different,” Shiro protested. “He’ll laugh if I look like David Bowie.”  
  
“First of all, King Jareth was everyone’s sexual awakening so don’t you even,” Lance shot back, brushing foundation on Shiro’s face, tickling his skin. “Second, trust my process. I do this every day.”  
  
“Wait, really? You wear makeup every day?”  
  
“I go for a more natural look.” Lance switched out the foundation brush for an eyeshadow brush, and Shiro closed his eyes. “Allura actually likes it when I put on something heavier. You should have seen us at Bi-Pride last year. Bi colors in a galaxy theme. Allura was so mad when we had to wash it off that night.”    
  
Shiro had seen Lance’s heavier makeup when they had gone on double-dates together, and it always looked really nice, perfectly color coordinated with his outfit and made his blue eyes pop, but he hadn’t realized this was something Lance did every day.  
  
“I’m mostly just gonna focus on your eyes,” Lance explained. “Kinda like what I do daily, so you’ll be given a more natural look, too. You have ridiculously pretty eyes, so we’re just gonna emphasize that a bit. That way when Keith walks in the room, your eyes is all he's gonna notice.”  
  
Shiro’s heart skipped a beat. Like when he had first met Keith. When the keg-stand champion looked at him and the whole world vanished as Shiro could only focus on that indigo stare.  
  
“Does Keith ever wear makeup?” He had never seen Keith put makeup on since they had been dating, but Shiro wondered if he had been that night they first met.  
  
“AAAAGGGH!” Lance suddenly exclaimed in sheer frustration. “That stupid face of his and he won’t let me go near it. I told him that I only want to put on some color, and he told me that he would break my arms.”  
  
Ooooh. Now Shiro got it. Sometimes Keith would go racing through campus with Lance at his heels, and Lance would be shouting, “C’MON, KEITH, BE MY CANVAS!!” which Shiro never really understood because he thought Lance was a theater major, not an art major.  
  
“I want to do something with that stupid face of his so bad,” Lance continued to mumble. “But at least he let me give him face masks. Like me, he tends to break out bad when he’s stressed. Baby steps, I guess.”  
  
“Maybe I can convince him,” Shiro offered because, wow, he kinda really wanted to see what Keith would look like in makeup.  
  
“That would be awesome.”  
  
There was a small stretch of silence, because they both knew that unless Keith could be convinced within a week, there was no way Lance would have the opportunity. Not unless Keith took a trip out to New Zealand.  
  
“You okay?” Lance asked, hand paused from putting on Shiro’s eyeliner. “You went really quiet. Things are gonna work out, you’ll see. Keith won’t be able to resist you once he sees you.”  
  
“Yeah, I’m fine.”  
  
Things were definitely going to be really quiet around here without Lance around, that’s for sure, and he wondered if maybe he should have tried to harder to convince Lance to change his mind. But Lance seemed happy with his decision, and from the lovey-dovey way he and Allura behaved around each other, she seemed happy with it, too. And it was their decision to make. Still, he was going to miss Lance, both of them, a lot. And if Lance were to stay, Shiro absolutely wanted Allura to stay, too.  
  
Shiro started to say so, and then decided against it. There would be time for that later. Tonight was supposed to be a fun night. A good night that would mark a fresh start for him and Keith.  


 

 

**12**  
  
It had been well over a week and a half since Shiro had spoken to Keith. His heart was racing all over again as he stepped into the foyer of Allura’s sorority house. A heavy sense of de-ja-vu came over him, and he was transported back to last November when Allura had convinced him to come to the sorority so he could meet someone. Someone with bright indigo eyes and a fiery disposition.  
  
Only this time, instead of throwing on something kind of nice just for the sake of appearances, Shiro had been dressed to kill. Lance put his outfit together, too. A purple shirt with the top few buttons loose to show off his collar bone and the top planes of his chest. A dark hoodie that matched his black jeans hung off his shoulders, unzipped. A leather necklace that dangled off his chest and then wrapped a second time around his neck like a collar. Leather bracelets to match but on only one wrist. And so. Much. Cologne. Lance had sprayed at least half a bottle of sharp, spicy musk all over him.  
  
Personally, Shiro felt like he was in a ska band, especially with the hoodie. When he’d said as much, Lance assured him that Keith would definitely come on the spot if that were the case because Keith had a weird fetish for ska bands. Yes, this… this was true. And Evanescence, Amy Lee being Keith’s first celebrity love.  
  
Well, Shiro came across a bit more like Tomas Kalnoky than Amy Lee at the moment, but hopefully it would be just as impressive. He certainly got lots of stares and compliments from the party goers as he walked by. Several dudes cheered when their new keg-stand champion had finally arrived, fashionably late at Lance’s insistence. And some of those dudes shifted a bit nervously as their sexuality was immediately brought into question. Because Lance promised he would make Shiro dressed to slay with one look, and, oh, had he delivered. The hoodie and jeans alone wouldn't have been that impressive, but Lance emphasized that it was all about the accessories. The accessories, the makeup, the pheromones, those things were what really mattered. According to Lance.  
  
Shiro tried to keep things casual. This piece of advice had come from Pidge, actually. Don’t look like he was actually looking for Keith, or eager to see him. Let Keith come to him on his own terms.  
  
If Shiro was being completely honest, he knew all he had to do was just call Keith and clear the air, even if it just meant leaving a voice message. The rest of the gang had been absolutely against this idea the moment the words had left Shiro’s mouth. They were having way too much fun doing things this way instead. And Shiro would be lying if he didn’t enjoy it just a bit. The clothes, the makeup, the atmosphere of setting this glittery trap.  
  
It was far more exciting.  
  
“Oh my God, I know that guy!”  
  
A girl’s shocked voice drew Shiro’s attention from the conversation he was having with one of his classmates from his aerodynamics course. They both looked curiously at her, as did many of the people within earshot.  
  
“Oh, that Jake King, guy?” This time a guy chimed in from across the room, thumb scrolling through his phone. “The one who works at Denny’s, right?”  
  
“Yeah, he’s missing!”  
  
Shiro’s stomach plummeted. More people were pulling out their phones now, clicking to their favorite social media outlets to get the news. Part of the human condition was being drawn to the intriguing. That’s what Keith had said. And Shiro was one of them.  
  
“Oh my God,” his classmate breathed, a quiet mimic of the girl’s earlier shocked exclamation as he gazed down at his own phone.  
  
There he was. A picture of him grinning at the camera, Denny’s dining room recognizable in the background.

 

> _Roan City University alumni Jacob King, age 22, has been officially declared missing by Roan City Police Department. King was last seen by his coworkers on April 23rd during his afternoon shift at Denny’s just off the college campus at the corner of University Road. When he did not report for his shift the next day, the manager on duty, Kristy Perkins, called his phone several times and receiving no answer. “It was the oddest thing,” Perkins, 34, remarks. “Jake has never been late to any of his shifts in the past year he has worked here. Not showing up for work at all, not even answering his phone, I just knew something was wrong, you know?”_
> 
> _  
> _ _Sheriff Dunning has gone on the record saying it is too soon to determine whether King’s disappearance is related to the string of disappearances that have occurred throughout the county since this past summer –_  
> 

The words blurred away.  
  
April 23rd.  
  
That was just this past week. That was the last time Shiro had seen Jake, too. When Jake forced a kiss on him.  
  
_Keith was there,_ a voice from far, far in the back of his mind whispered, a dark voice from that dark place Shiro had been trying so hard to avoid visiting since his release from the hospital. _Keith saw Jake kiss you. That’s why Keith hasn’t been speaking to you and avoiding everyone else. That's why Keith's so_ upset.  
  
Well, sure, Shiro kind of had a feeling that was the case. But the dread building in the pit of his stomach along with the sadistic little voice told him not to be so naïve, that it had been deeper than that.  
  
The article didn’t say much more about Jake other than he had a BA in English Literature, and stayed in town working at the local Denny’s “until something better comes along”. Shiro wasn’t really interested in all those details. What really caught his attention were the related articles at the end. A thumbnail of one was of a girl he recognized. Yes, that was the same girl from the grocery store he had been chatting with when she slipped on the wet floor and went toppling into his arms. Heart pounding heavily, not from anticipation this time but absolute dread, Shiro clicked on the thumbnail.  
  
**Mysterious Disappearances Begin Again In Roan City!** the headline screamed at him. That girl’s picture was there. And there were two more people he recognized. An old high school classmate from the gym he frequented. And Amber, Risa’s friend, who tried to hook up with him at the club. And… okay, he didn’t recognize this guy. Emmet Johnson. Scrolling through the article, Shiro spotted a small blurb about him.  
 

> _“Police searched Johnson’s house to find a disturbing amount of photographs of  in various stages of undress and nudity. ‘Given the quality of the photos, blurriness, and each subject’s attention diverted from the camera, we suspect each photo had been taken without the subject’s knowledge...’”_  
> 

The water park. The camera noise they heard.  
  
Keith had been there, too.  
  
_Keith was with you when you encountered all those people. Isn’t that the strangest coincidence?_  
  
That didn’t mean anything. It couldn’t. It was –  
  
_Crazy?_  
 

> _The disappearances of Roan County citizens began last July and came to a standstill the following November. Just when police felt confident that the nightmare had come to an end, the disappearances began anew just this past March. Police are unsure whether the serial kidnapper had returned, or if this may perhaps be the work of a copycat –  
>  _

November. And then March.  
  
November when he met Keith, the disappearances stopped. In March, Keith had started acting jealous and possessive, and the disappearances had, just as the article stated, begun anew.  
  
And Risa. Poor, crying Risa, desperate to find her friend. The friend Keith had lured to the house as a prank.  
_  
__I killed someone._ Keith had said with such an unreadable expression. When talking about the raccoons in his basement. After messing around in his garden. Where the most delicious, reddest tomatoes grew.  
  
“I’ll kill him!”  
  
Shiro snapped out of his thoughts with Allura storming into the room, Lance following close behind, trying, unsuccessfully, to calm her down. The party at this point had pretty much resumed it’s activities, no longer caring about poor Jacob King. As such, nobody really paid attention when Allura threw herself in an armchair, thumbing furiously on her phone.  
  
“What’s wrong?” Shiro asked. As if he didn’t already know the answer.  
  
Lance gave him an apologetic look, and even Allura’s expression softened. “Keith’s not here,” Lance said. “And he’s not picking up his phone, either.”  
  
Allura’s lip trembled with both rage and pain. “He was supposed to be here. Everyone was supposed to be here, the six of us, we were supposed to – “ She choked, gripping her phone hard. Lance sat down behind her and pushed a few curls to the side so he could rub her back. “Is it me?” She whimpered. “Is he angry because I’m leaving?”  
  
“No way,” Lance replied, and Shiro shook his head.  
  
“No, it’s not you, Allura,” Shiro added. “He cares about you more than anything. He would never miss this party, no matter how mad at you he is. It’s something else.”  
  
Allura and Lance both stared at him, and Shiro took a deep breath.  
  
“I know where Keith is. I’ll go get him and bring him back. I’ll make this right, I promise.”  


 

 

**13**  
  
The house was dark. It was the kind of darkness that felt ominous and wrong. The kind of darkness where something lurked, watching, waiting to strike at the right moment.  
  
Hunk had been generous enough to let Shiro use Old Yeller given the urgency of the situation so that Shiro didn’t have to wait around for an Uber. Not that Shiro was worried about arriving too late. He was pretty sure poor Jake the Waiter was long gone. Never to be seen by anyone ever again.  
  
The others had offered to accompany Shiro, but he told them to stay behind and enjoy the party. This was something for him to do alone.  
  
The porch creaked beneath the weight of Shiro’s boots as he approached the front door. The once friendly door that had welcomed him whenever he came over to visit his boyfriend now loomed menacingly, as if daring him to step inside. He knocked. When there was no answer, Shiro took out his key and let himself in.  
  
“Keith?” he called out.  
  
There was no answer, but Shiro knew Keith was home.  
  
The smell was horrendous. Stale air from a house that hadn’t been opened in days combined with the thick odor of iron that seemed to dig into every pore on Shiro’s skin. Iron and bodily fluid and excretion. Shiro knew this smell very, very well. Sometimes he could reimagine it in his dreams. Sometimes when he was awake, too.  
  
A smell of death. Of recent death. Just before the body begins to decompose.  
  
“Keith, it’s me,” Shiro called out again. No answer, but Shiro knew that Keith was in the house, not outside tending to his garden.  
  
The basement door stood wide open.  


 

 

**14**  
  
Like the porch, the steps creaked and groaned beneath Shiro’s feet as he walked downstairs. The smell was thickest here. A dark lump lay on the floor in a puddle of even darker stains.  
  
Keith stood there, a knife in his hand. The gleaming blade was coated in bright, bright red. And not tomato juice this time. _“Shiiiiro,”_ Keith said softly, slowly turning around. “You finally came down here.” He was grinning as if something amused him, but his dark eyes were blank.  
  
Shiro released the breath he had been holding. He wasn’t sure what he was going to feel when he came down here, and he wasn’t sure what he felt now other than complete relief. “You’re okay,” Shiro said softly.  
  
Keith just stared at him. The grin faded.

Maybe Shiro was a bit crazy, too. After all, he just caught his boyfriend murdering someone. Poor Jake the Waiter. Nothing more than a lump of useless flesh on the dirty basement floor. And, honestly, Shiro didn't care. He only cared about this young man standing before him still very much alive.   
  
“I’ve been really worried about you. I haven’t seen you, and you’re not picking up your phone," Shiro continued.   
  
Now Keith looked a bit startled, Shiro's words surprising the life back into his eyes. “What are you talking about?” Keith shot back, hands shaking, blood drops falling from the knife.  
  
“I never wanted to break up with you. I just wanted us to take some time for ourselves and see where this is going.”  
  
“Are you stupid!?” Keith shrieked. “There is a dead fucker lying right here! I just killed the Denny’s fuck who made the moves on you! I saw it! I followed him! I dragged his ass back here and I tortured him for three days straight! And all you can focus on is our relationship?” He burst out laughing then. “I never meant to do any of this. _You_ were the one who was supposed to die! _You_ were going to be my best kill! This knife... this knife was supposed to be meant for _you,_ not wasted on this sad sack of shit! But you just wouldn’t let me kill you! You had to take things slow, you had to be romantic, you had to… you had to…” He trailed off, choking on whatever else he was trying to say. "You... had to... you had to be so _perfect..."_

Well, he was far from perfect. Shiro took a step forward. And another. Walking ever so casually, but careful not to step on the blood and bodily fluid covering the floor. Keith clutched the knife in his hand tighter, and tried to back away but the back of his foot hit Jake the Waiter’s body.  
  
“Do you still want to kill me, Keith?" Shiro asked softly. "Do you still want me to be your best kill? Will that make you happy?”  
  
Shiro really had no intentions of dying any time soon, but if Keith were to take that knife and stab him to death with it, he wouldn’t stop him. Maybe this was how he was meant to atone for everything he had done to his own victims, enemies of his home and country, indeed, but the way he had killed them all made them his personal victims. There were far worse deaths than at the hands of the one he loved so much, and it was certainly a better death than he deserved.  
  
He wrapped his arms around Keith, pulling him in close and tight.  
  
“Go on,” Shiro whispered.  
  
Keith had gone stiff as a board and didn’t move for a long, long moment. Then there was a sharp clang as the knife clattered to the ground.  
  
“I **_can’t!”_** Keith cried in a helpless sob, and his bloodied hands clutched at Shiro’s back, fingers digging into his shirt and leaving dark stains. “I can’t, I can’t! I would never hurt you, Shiro! Never! I can’t! I love you so much, Shiro. I love you. I love you!”

Shiro held him for a long, long moment. In that dark basement. While a corpse bled at their feet. And those details didn't matter at all. Keith, the young man he had grown to love so much, was back in his arms where he belonged. And if that made Shiro a monster, because he chose to love a monster, then so be it. He was already a monster, anyway.  
  
“Heh. You know, when I asked you to meet me at Denny’s, I planned on telling you the same thing," Shiro confessed into Keith's hair.   
  
Keith sniffed. “Really?”  
  
Shiro gently pushed Keith off him a little so he could look into those indigo eyes that had him captivated from the very beginning. His hand tenderly wiped the tears from Keith’s soaked cheeks. “You look so cute right now,” Shiro whispered lovingly. He leaned in for a kiss but Keith ducked away.  
  
“Ugh, don’t! I feel so _gross_ right now! I’m like covered in blood and snot!”  
  
“You’re not gross. You’re cute no matter what you’re covered in.” And Shiro tried kissing him again, and Keith kept ducking away.  
  
“God, you’re such a _nerd!”_  


 

 

**15**  
  
“So let me get this straight,” Keith began as they sat in Old Yeller, watching the smoke rise from the house a few streets away as sirens blared in the distance. “You are completely okay with me killing about a dozen people since last summer.”  
  
“Hmm,” Shiro mused aloud. “Maybe not entirely okay with it. The jealousy thing doesn’t sit very well with me. It’s not healthy for a relationship. If we want this to work, then you’re going to have to be okay with people hitting on me. But I would never do anything that makes you uncomfortable, either.”  
  
Keith blinked at him with that unreadable expression of his. “I am the infamous Roan City serial killer, and you are worried about potential relationship issues,” he deadpanned.  
  
“These things are important. And maybe something we should’ve discussed earlier.”  
  
“You are way too calm about all this.”  
  
Shiro gave him a cryptic smile. “Let’s just say I kinda understand where you’re coming from.”  
  
Keith arched an eyebrow. “When you killed people, you were in the military. You were doing what you were supposed to.”  
  
“Maybe. But what I did to those people is a different story. And killing is killing. You can justify it all you want, but in the end, it’s all the same. So who am I to judge?”  
  
They sat in silence for a little while longer. The sirens were much louder now. One fire truck had pulled up to the house completely consumed in flames. Shiro glanced over at Keith as they watched his house go up in smoke, and in the faint red light from the fire blazing far away, he could see a smirk on Keith’s face.  
  
“You know that place is in my old man’s name. The mortgage was paid off years ago, and he pays for all the bills, utilities, cable, everything. As far as the city is concerned, I don’t live there, but in the dorms. And as far as this country is concerned, my dad never had a son. We don’t even have the same surname. Pretty sure Song is actually my mother’s.”    
  
“Your dad is gonna become the Roan City serial killer,” Shiro concluded.  
  
“Yup.”  
  
Now, Shiro wasn't a Psychology major or had any aspirations to be, but - “…is this your way of punishing him?”  
  
Keith was silent for a moment, and then shrugged. “Nah. It’s just convenient.”  
  
Fire fighters were struggling to put out the flames now. Neighbors were gathering by their porches, watching from a safe distance. Tomato yowled from the backseat of Hunk’s car in irritation, lying on the boxes of few possessions Keith had packed before they decided to set his dad’s house aflame. She did not ask for her whole life to be suddenly stuffed into a car like this. They were going to have a fun time keeping her a secret in Shiro’s room. At least Shiro didn’t have a roommate, one of the perks of being an old coot going back to college.  
  
“Where were you putting the bodies, anyway?” Shiro asked.  
  
Keith gave him this look. An _oh-please_ look.  
  
“Not the garden!” Shiro cried.  
  
Keith grinned. “Human decay makes great fertilizer.” 


	6. Epilogue

_**Ten years later...** _

 

 

**1**  
  
It was amazing how much could change in the span of a decade. And even more amazing how much actually stayed the same. Roan City didn’t grow much, although a new shop or restaurant chain opened up almost every other week. Many had abandoned the mall for a massive outdoor shopping center downtown. That was where they lit the city’s Christmas tree every year from now on.   
  
Hunk and Pidge were still together. No children yet, and no real interest in making any in the near future. They were perfectly content with the many robots they built for fun. They started their own company devoted to robotics research and streamlining engineering technology. Most of the money they acquired went to various charity groups, most of which focused on science education and programs that introduced children to STEM fields. They continued to live humble lives… now with a lot more robots.   
  
Lance and Allura were still together. And still alive. Ten years later, and nobody had still gotten over their sudden announcement at Allura’s sorority going away. They had gotten married, to make things easier for Lance to stay with her in New Zealand. A quick little trip to the courthouse just before the party started. The entire house had all but literally blown the roof off with their screams. So, yeah, Lance and Allura were still married, still alive, and according to Facebook, Allura was pregnant with their second child. They must have been doing alright if they were bringing children into all this. Then again, Allura assured them that while things had been a little dramatic in the beginning, everything had significantly calmed down. In fact, keeping things calm was why she had to go back in the first place. And as long as she was there, their lives were for the most part normal. Even Lance had admitted things were a little more boring than he would have liked, nothing at all like the movies. They came back to this hemisphere often, visiting Lance’s family in California and Cuba, and, of course, stopping by to hang out with their old college friends.   
  
And Shiro and Keith? They were married, and trying their hands at living the suburban life just outside of Roan City where Shiro worked at the planetarium, and Keith worked at home as a freelance writer and "house-spouse". They had adopted only one child about five years ago, a little girl named Katherine, who was now going on eight. She was a spunky little thing with a head of black curls and eyes a deep blue and a mouth that spouted off all the sass Keith could influence out of her. But she had Shiro’s sweet nature, too. So Shiro often claimed. They also finally had a car, instead of just Keith’s motorcycle. Keith had been against the idea at first because of expenses, saying they could just strap the baby to Shiro’s back while out on the motorcycle, and Shiro couldn’t believe he had to point out that something like that was extremely illegal in all fifty States.  
  
Those first few years of marriage had been rather bumpy. With Shiro still going to school to get his Master’s and his GI Bill only able to give so much, and so he was always studying and working to help make ends meet in that dinky cheap apartment they rented together after burning Keith’s house to the ground. Shiro had no idea he was even capable of fighting with Keith so much as the stress, frustration,  and lack of sleep all came boiling to the surface. But they worked things out. They always did.   
  
Raising a child had not been any easier, even with financial stability now that Shiro had a nerdy astronomy job. Now instead of money, they would sometimes fight over how to raise her. Especially when things didn’t always go the way they planned, and they both stressed over having done something wrong. They were two very messed up people, and now they were going to mess up their daughter, too. But the bounce in Kat’s step and the bright smile on her precious face every day said otherwise. Doctors and teachers alike reported that she was thriving in her environment.   
  
They were happy. Ultimately, no matter what hang-ups came their way, they always overcame them and they were happy.   


 

 

**2**  
  
Shiro had a dream about raccoons again last night. Bloated things, fat like ripe tomatoes, and bleeding bright red tomato paste. He hadn’t had a dream like that in a long, long time, and he didn’t think much of it until he pulled into the driveway to see Keith’s motorcycle in the garage. He said this morning that he was going to spend all day running errands. He shouldn't be home.  
  
That’s when the dream came back to him in full, vivid detail.   
_  
_ Keith, what did you do?   
  
He was jumping to conclusions. He had to be. Keith told him years ago that the itch didn’t bother him anymore. And he proved it by not doing anything to anyone. He had never been caught for the Roan City murders, never even suspected, but Shiro didn’t want to push his luck any further than it had already been. His father wasn’t around anymore to take the fall for him again. Jason had never been caught, either, no one could find him, and as far as Roan City police were concerned, that was proof enough of his guilt.   
  
Things were different this time. Keith had taken Shiro’s last name, dropping his mother’s maiden name like a hot potato. They were married, they owned a house together, a car together, adopted together. Keith’s name was now everywhere. If he had done something, he could be found. Easily.   
  
Shiro rushed into the house. “Keith?” He called out. Tomato, the old cat, looked up irritably from her spot on top of the couch, and then buried her head in her paws to go back to sleep. All she did was sleep these days.  
  
And there was Keith, standing in the hallway leading into the kitchen, about to go down into the basement. Bright red splattered all over his arms, torso, and a few fat drops dripping down his face. He had been in the process of moving a body down to the basement, a trail as crimson as the red splattered all over him trailing from the body all the way into the kitchen. But he had froze when Shiro walked in the door. Because Shiro wasn’t supposed to be home, either. He had decided to take a half day on a whim. Maybe even surprise his family with dinner.   
  
For a long, long, long moment, Keith and Shiro just stared at each other.   
  
The body on the floor was of a woman, and beneath all the blood streaming out of various stab wounds, Shiro recognized the flowery lilac blouse.   
  
“Is that… Helen Gregory?”   
  
Those deep indigo eyes glanced down at the body and then back at Shiro. “...Maybe.”   
  
Oh God, oh God, Keith had finally done it. Shiro should have known to take those mumblings of how Keith was going to kill her one day seriously.   
  
Helen Gregory was the self-designated “leader” of the cul-de-sac (as if there was such a thing) and head of the PTA at Katherine’s school. In other words, she was, well, a bit of a bitch. As designated “house-spouse”, Keith had to put up with her the most and had titled her the Great [Redacted] of Suburbia (Shiro absolutely refused to call her what Keith did on the regular, no matter how unreasonable she was. Also, Keith needed to work on his language with Kat around). Needless to say, she and Keith did not get along, and not just because of two extremely assertive personalities clashing. The PTA was made up of mostly women, after all, and Keith was young, handsome, a dad to a cute little girl, and therefore far, far more popular than Helen. And so, the drama between the two started to escalate.   
  
It had started with the basic competitive house-spouse nonsense. Brownies. Barbecues. Outlandish birthday parties. Shiro had started getting worried about Keith, wondering if maybe he should get a job or something that got him out of the house because he went full force with this rivalry. Shiro had even called up Lance, all but begging him to move him and Allura into the neighborhood just so Keith could have his old rival back (Lance had, of course, declined but not without bitterly expressing that Keith had replaced him).   
  
Then one day, Keith had remarked that Helen Gregory’s husband was like Oscar Meyer deli meat while _his_ husband was prime Angus beef, and hooo boy, the knock that slammed against the door when Shiro had come home that afternoon. Anthony Gregory was an average sized man, really, and Shiro absolutely had understood his rage at this unwarranted insult. Shiro had apologized profusely, but that hadn’t stopped Pidge and Hunk, who had been visiting at the time, from hanging posters that Keith’s and Helen’s husbands were going to fight. That had that been an awkward evening when the whole neighborhood had suddenly showed up in his yard to watch. Needless to say, everyone had gone home disappointed, and Keith had been banished to the couch (he had snuck back into bed later that night, but it was the thought that counted).   
  
Things had gone quiet between Keith and Helen after that. Maybe too quiet. Now they were permanently quiet because Helen Gregory was lying dead in their hallway.   
  
Shiro struggled to keep from losing it. “Keith, what the fu – !!” He stopped himself just in time. He wasn’t going to swear. He had gone great lengths to work on his language with Kat in their lives now, and he wasn’t going to throw all that hard work away just because Keith was trying to stash a fresh corpse in the basement.   
  
He tried again. “Keith, I thought we talked about this. You _promised_ me you wouldn’t let your jealousy issues get out of hand again.”   
  
Of course, the idea of Helen Gregory attracted to him was just as shocking as her body bleeding all over his floor, he never even noticed -   
  
Keith gawked, mouth open. “Wha- _Jealous?_ Shiro, no! _She said shit about our daughter!”_   
  
“What?”   
  
What?  
  
“At the PTA meeting last week. We were going over the last minute details for the art competition. And Helen’s big ass mouth had to bring up our kids’ pieces. Of course, her precious little brat was going to win, but everyone else did their best, so she says in that condescending way of hers. Then she talks shit about Kitty-Kat’s piece, saying that she probably should be disqualified because it was obvious she copied from a picture and that would be cheating.”   
  
The art competition was just a fun thing the PTA had put together for the elementary school, with humble prizes like a $25 gift card to Pizza Hut and school supplies and things like that. No big deal, and mostly to foster friendly competition between the kids and let them show off their skills. The picture their little Kit-Kat had drawn was an eight-year-old’s artistic version of the selfie Keith and Shiro had taken in front of the Kerberos roller coaster on their amusement park date all those years ago. Kat had added herself and Tomato in the picture, too. They had taken her to that amusement park many times, but Kerberos had long since been replaced by a bigger, more thrilling ride. It had taken Keith a moment to realize what he had been looking at when Helen, the art competition coordinator, dragged out Kat’s piece for the rest of the PTA to see, and then he had almost – almost – completely lost his shit on her then and there.   
  
Kat had refused to show her dads that piece before the art competition. She had wanted it to be a surprise.   
  
Helen had not revealed the other kids’ drawings, not even her own. Apparently, Kat’s was the only one that concerned her for "breaking the rules". The only reason Keith had not stabbed Helen in front of God and everybody had been because Stephanie, one of the younger moms, had stepped in. Stephanie actually was an artist, working with mostly digital watercolor of fantasy subjects with several published books. She had pointed out that there were no rules against copying, and that referencing material was something even professional artists, such as herself, used all the time as part of their tools. And that was all it took for everyone to agree that Kat should be allowed to compete. For the other parents, that had been the end of that.   
  
But not for Keith.   
  
That had been too far. Way too far.   
  
And Shiro didn’t disagree with him.   
  
He took a deep breath to collect himself. Also to stop himself from asking Keith to stab Helen’s dead body several more times for his own satisfaction. He had no idea their selfie had been Kat’s subject for her art competition. And for her to add herself and old, aging Tomato who had been barely older than a kitten back then, their precious picture had now become something indescribable. And Helen had tried to desecrate that. Turn into something ugly and petty because she thought Keith was a threat to her visions of grandeur.   
  
“Just keep her there, Keith,” he said. “If you get blood on the carpet, we’ll never get it out.”  
  
“I have to pick up Kat in a few hours, what are we gonna do with the body until then?” Keith shot back.   
  
Shiro couldn’t believe he already had an idea forming in mind, but then again, when your husband is a serial killer, it was probably not a bad skill to have.   


 

 

**3**  
  
Shiro wasn’t at all worried when the detectives showed up at their doorstep. He even invited them inside for refreshments. He and Keith had done an exceptional job of cleaning up. They had Allura on video chat with them at the time as she had a rather frightening yet unsurprising knowledge of how to erase a murder scene.   
  
Detectives Rolo and Nyma only had a few questions, the same ones they had asked everyone in the neighborhood. At first, they were the standard “have you seen anything” and “what were you doing the day of”, that sort of thing. Of course, they had already heard Keith’s rivalry with Helen, that the two of them didn’t get along whatsoever.   
  
“It is what it is,” Shiro remarked with a shrug. “Parent drama. Keith was becoming more popular than Helen, and she didn’t like it.”   
  
Nyma and Rolo exchanged looks. “Trust me, sir, this ain’t the first time a murder has happened over a PTA meeting gone wrong,” Rolo drawled as if this case could not be any less exciting for him. “Parents can be extremely overprotective of their kids. There was one case we had a few years back where one parent shot another just because little Jack Jr. only got second place in a race. And soccer matches…” He trailed off with a visible shudder.   
  
“Keith, had you ever had thoughts of hurting Helen Gregory?” Nyma asked.   
  
“Of course,” Keith immediately replied. “She was a class A cun – “   
  
Shiro sharply kicked him under the table.   
  
“ – she was an awful person,” Keith corrected himself. “Trust me, nobody liked her. So, yeah, maybe I had a few bad thoughts about her. Especially after she tried to humiliate my child.”   
  
“Keith,” Shiro began.  
  
“What? I’m just being honest. But it’s not like I would actually do anything. I got my kid to think about. Helen Gregory isn’t worth putting my family in jeopardy over.”   
  
Both detectives nodded sympathetically. They had gotten their share of bitter remarks from the rest of the neighborhood about Helen’s awfulness, and Keith had not been the only one targeted by her. Only most of the other parents hadn’t wanted to go against her because she had been frighteningly assertive and her power of manipulation and blackmail made her almost untouchable for years. While Keith had been one of the few to actually stand up to Helen’s bullying, he was not much more of a suspect than about twenty other people.

After a few more questions, the detectives said their goodbyes, saying that they would get back in touch if they find out anything new.   
  
“Oh, by the way,” Nyma said as she walked out the door, “I saw your garden out back. It’s lovely. I have a bit of a green thumb myself.”   
  
“Thanks,” Keith replied proudly. “We plan on growing tomatoes soon. I make my own sauce and everything.”   
  
“You handled that well,” Shiro said once he shut the door and locked it for good measure.   
  
Keith smirked. “Were you worried?”   
  
Shiro rested his hands on his husband’s waist. “A bit. You were getting almost a little too honest back there.”   
  
“The less innocent I try to sound, the less I’ll come across as a suspect,” Keith replied. “Most try too hard to look as pure and innocent as possible. And last I checked, having homicidal thoughts about someone isn’t illegal.”   
  
“Are you seriously going to grow tomatoes again?”   
  
“Um, yes. They were delicious last time.” Keith traced his fingers over Shiro’s lips, leaning up close. “And I seemed to recall you loving those tomatoes,” he teased, hips flushing against Shiro’s.   
  
They were just about to kiss when – “Ew! Why do you two gotta be so gross all the time!?”   
  
Kat stood at the top of the stairs with her arms wrapped around a stuff Lion, sticking her tongue out. “Are the cops gone? Can I come out of my room now?”   
  
Keith grinned at her. “If you come out of your room, then you’re gonna get the Papa Keef kisses!”   
  
Kat shrieked as Keith raced up the stairs to attack her with affection. Shiro laughed, then yelled, “After that, you’ll get Papa Shiro kisses!”   
  
“But I like Papa Shiro kisses!” Kat shouted back, between her shrieks and giggles and the sound of Keith capturing her on her bed.   
  
“Oh, you’re in for it now, kid,” Keith playfully warned, followed by more shrieks of laughter.   
  
As Shiro went up the stairs, he decided that he was happy. He really, truly was happy.   
  
Even with a dead body currently decomposing in his backyard.   


 

 

**~End~**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that's all she wrote! Thank you so, so much for all your support! Once again, I'd like to thank the Sheith Big Bang mods for this opportunity and putting up with all my extension requests. Thank you, Mikuridaigo, for your beta work and giving me much needed advice and always letting me bounce my ideas off of you. Thank you, BBR and Grey, for your lovely, GORGEOUS artwork to accompany this fic. It was an absolute pleasure meeting and collaborating with you to bring this project to life. 
> 
> Sometimes a family is a disabled veteran, a serial killer, their daughter and a cat named Tomato. And maybe a dead body or two. 
> 
> ~Shardy


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